!  II  liii 


llilfli! 


11  ! 


i 


ii 


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liilll !  llilM  II 


REESE  LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

1    UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFOb  vflA. 


Class 


'!M/-v¥nHri"j-VSi-.".  i'j-TV/nViTMi-illtJTBKMi-vH.-vVj-J'n'T; 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 


TOLSTOI PROPHET   OF  THE   LAST   GENERATION 

Taken  especially  for  the  author  in  1906 


Russia's    Message 

The  True  World 
Import  of  the  Revolution 


By 
WILLIAM  ENGLISH  WALLING 


ILLUSTRATED 


New  York 

Doubleday,  Page  &  Company 

1908 


-r 


COPYWGHT,    1908,   BY 

IXJUBLEDAY,   PAGE  &   COMPANY 

PUBLISHED,  JUNE,    1908 


ALL  RIGHTS  KESERVED     INCLUDING  THAT  OF   TRANSLATION 
INTO  FOREIGN  LANGUAGES,  INCLUDING  THE  SCANDINAVIAN 


^36 


\ 


TO  THE  MEN  AND  WOMEN  WHO  IN  ALL  WALKS  OP 
LIFE  ARE  CONTENDING  AGAINST  THE  FORCES  THAT 
ARE  TRYING  TO  INTRODUCE  INTO  AMERICA  THE 
DESPOTISM  AND  CLASS-RULE  OF  EASTERN  EUROPE; 
TO  ALL  THOSE  WHO,  IN  THE  TRADITIONAL  REV- 
OLUTIONARY AMERICAN  SPIRIT,  ARE  LEADING 
OUR  COUNTRY  AGAINST  ALL  THE  REACTIONARY  TEN- 
DENCIES PREVAILING  IN  POLITICS,  MORALITY, 
EDUCATION,  LITERATURE,  AND  SCIENCE,  TO  ITS 
GREAT    DEMOCRATIC    AND     SOCIAL     WORLD- DESTINY 


173175 


PREFATORY  NOTE 

It  is  impossible  to  harmonise  the  Russian  spelling,  with  its 
twenty-six  letters  of  a  different  alphabet,  with  the  spelling  of 
any  other  modern  language.  As  a  consequence  there  are  often 
half  a  dozen  ways  of  putting  into  English,  French  or  German 
letters  the  name  of  some  well-known  Russian,  consequently 
the  reader  must  not  be  surprised  to  see  a  Russian  name  which 
he  has  been  accustomed  to  see  spelled  in  one  way,  here  spelled 
in  another;  for  example,  I  have  spelled  the  name  of  the  present 
prime  minister  Stolypine,  whereas  the  reader  may  possibly 
know  the  name  better  as  Stolypin,  or  Stolipin. 


PREFACE 

No  ONE  who  has  seen  and  understood  the  social  upheaval 
now  going  on  in  Russia  can  doubt  that  the  Russian  people 
have  a  message.  It  does  not  need  to  be  written  down;  it  is 
carried  abroad  by  every  telegram.  But  to  understand  the 
whole  message  the  situation  must  be  seen  and  understood  as 
a  whole. 

I  have  undertaken  to  make  a  plain  statement  of  this  situa- 
tion, omitting  no  feature  of  the  first  importance  and  relating 
all  together  as  a  single  whole.  I  have  not  written  suggesting 
what  we  can  do  for  Russia,  but  rather  what  Russia  has  to  offer 
us;  I  have  concerned  myself  with  the  universal  qualities  of  the 
Russian  people  rather  than  with  any  aspect  of  their  character 
and  situation  that  is  peculiar  to  themselves.  I  have  not 
written  historically  for  the  benefit  of  the  academic  student,  nor 
sought  to  dwell  on  the  picturesqueness  of  those  sections  of 
Russia  and  aspects  of  Russian  life  that  are  most  strange;  I 
have  not  dwelt  on  personal  experience,  as  the  situation  is  too 
large  to  be  presented  in  all  its  aspects  in  any  personal  narrative. 
I  have  sought  rather,  through  the  personal  acquaintance  with 
a  majority  of  the  most  important  leaders  of  all  parties  and 
elements  of  the  Russian  nation,  to  put  myself  in  the  most 
immediate  contact  with  the  inner  ideas  and  spirit  of  the  great 
struggle  and  to  present  this  struggle  to  the  reader  as  seen  through 
the  eyes  of  its  leaders  themselves. 

Finally,  I  have  written  not  for  the  casual  reader  or  for  him 
who  draws  from  this  tragic  and  inspiring  situation  a  mere 
interest  in  the  chances  of  the  fight  or  in  its  melodramatic  aspects. 
I  appeal  rather  to  those  seriously  interested  in  the  Russian 
revolutionary  movement  for  the  Hght  it  sheds  on  that  all- 
inclusive  problem,  the  future  of  human  society. 

The  greater  part  of  two  years  I  have  spent  in  Russia  in  order 
to  gain  a  rounded  view.  My  attention  was  first  drawn  to  the 
absorbing  interest  of  this  great  struggle  by  Polish  and  Jewish 

ix 


X  RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 

Russian  exiles  met  while  I  was  living  among  them  in  the 
University  Settlement  in  New  York.  Leaving  the  United  States 
shortly  after  the  massacre  of  January  22,  1905,  I  spent  several 
months  in  London,  Paris,  Geneva,  Cracow,  and  Vienna  among 
leaders  of  the  revolutionary  parties  of  all  factions  and  races. 
Within  a  week  after  the  Czar  issued  his  October  Manifesto 
I  was  in  Warsaw,  and  a  few  days  later  in  St.  Petersburg,  where 
I  at  once  met  Witte  and  the  chief  members  of  his  ministry,  and 
at  the  same  time  put  myself  in  touch  with  the  most  conspirative 
of  the  revolutionary  organisations.  I  spent  the  larger  part  of 
my  time  in  that  country  from  this  date  until  the  opening  of 
the  third  Duma.  Near  the  close  of  my  last  visit  the  press  of  the 
United  States,  and  the  leading  European  countries,  announced 
the  arrest  of  myself  and  wife  and  her  sister  and  our  detention 
for  twenty-four  hours  in  prison  through  the  acknowledged 
mistake,  or  perhaps  inconsideration,  of  the  Russian  Govern- 
ment. It  is  not  true,  as  was  suggested  then  in  a  few  papers, 
that  the  Russian  Government  made  either  a  direct  or  indirect 
request  through  the  American  ambassador  that  we  should 
leave  the  country.  We  had  wished  to  follow  Russian  events 
closely  only  until  the  meeting  of  the  third  Duma,  and  we  left 
St.  Petersburg  on  the  day  on  which  we  had  previously  arranged 
to  go.  It  was  explained  by  the  Russian  political  police  that  our 
arrest  was  due  to  our  friendly  relations  with  certain  revolu- 
tionists. I  have  certainly  had  such  relations  with  hundreds 
of  leading  persons  of  this  movement,  as  with  an  almost  equal 
number  of  their  opponents. 

I  have  to  some  extent  made  use  of  articles  that  I  have  written 
for  various  magazines  —  particularly  the  Independent,  in 
which  perhaps  a  score  of  my  articles  appeared  in  the  course 
of  1906  and  1907.  I  have  also  made  some  use  of  articles 
published  in  Collier's  Weekly,  the  Outlook,  the  World  To-day, 
Charities,  the  American  Federationist,  and  Moody's  Financial 
Magazine.  However,  nine-tenths  of  the  present  book  is 
entirely  new. 

,  Realising  the  immensity  of  the  task  that  lay  before  me,  I 
have  confined  my  attention  in  the  present  work  largely  to  the 
Russian  part  of  Russia,  leaving  aside  entirely  all 
Asiatic     Russia,     the     Caucasus    and    the    Baltic   Provinces,, 


PREFACE  xi 

Poland,  and  Finland.  The  Polish  and  Finnish  situations  are 
of  such  exceptional  importance  in  relation  to  the  Russian  that 
I  spent  several  weeks  in  visiting  both  countries,  but  I  have 
not  made  them  a  part  of  my  work. 

One  feature  of  the  book  needs  perhaps  a  special  explanation* 
The  crimes  of  the  Russian  Government  are  so  monstrous  and 
so  manifold  that  I  have  quite  despaired  of  giving  any  satis- 
factory picture  of  them  as  a  whole.  In  my  first  chapters  I 
have  dwelt  at  some  length  with  this  subject,  but  I  have  devised 
the  economical  measure  of  taking  the  Jews  as  my  central  theme, 
not  because  I  consider  that  their  persecutions  are  any  worse  than 
other  peoples'  in  Russia,  nor  because  they  are  more  important 
than  other  nationalities,  as  for  instance  the  Tartars  or  the  Poles,, 
but  because  they  have  themselves  been  selected  by  the  Govern- 
ment as  the  centre  of  the  whole  persecution  system.  In  other 
parts  of  the  book  I  have  tried  to  portray  not  merely  the  central 
feature  but  the  whole  situation. 

If  I  had  cared  to  burden  my  work  with  footnotes  showing 
the  source  of  all  my  information  I  could  readily  have  done  so; 
but  this  would  have  increased  very  largely  the  bulk  of  the 
volume,  besides  interrupting  the  attention  of  the  average 
reader,  interested  rather  in  the  facts  themselves  than  in  the 
source  from  which  they  come.  I  am  prepared,  however,  to 
give  my  authority  for  every  detail,  just  as  much  as  if  I  had  been 
writing  a  history  or  a  scientific  sociological  work. 

I  owe  little  to  writers  of  books  and  much  to  active  leaders  in 
the  movement.  Of  these  I  have  met  hundreds.  It  would  be 
impossible  in  a  few  pages  to  mention  even  their  names.  To  a 
few  persons,  however,  I  am  especially  indebted ;  among  the  fore- 
most are:    Prince  M who  introduced    me    to    the    Czar's 

ministers,  Witte  and  the  rest,  as  well  as  to  several  of  his  most 
important  generals  and  who  kept  me  for  the  whole  period  of  my 
visit  in  close  touch  with  the  situation  in  court  circles  and  the 
ministry;  to  Mr.  David  Sosskis,  the  able  correspondent  of  the 
London  Tribune;  Mr.  Harold  Williams,  correspondent  of  the 
Manchester  Guardian,  a  valued  friend  of  the  Constitutional 
Democratic  Party ;  to  Madame  Turkova,  one  of  the  most  active 
and  important  leaders  of  that  party ;  to  the  Countess  Bobrinsky 
of  Moscow,  one  of  the  organisers  both  of  the  Constitutional 


xii  RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 

Democratic  Party  and  of  the  Peasants'  Union;  to  Professor 
Milyoukov,  whose  high  personal  quahties  are  appreciated  even 
by  his  severest  critics;  to  the  poet  Tan  (Borgoraz),  a  founder 
of  the  Peasants'  Union  and  of  the  National  Socialist  Party  and 
an  active  leader  in  all  the  most  revolutionary  but  non-partisan 
movements;  to  Aladdin,  the  most  active  and  valuable,  if  not  the 
most  influential,  of  the  Labour  Group;  to  Volkovsky,  Tchai- 
kovsky, Gershuni,  Chisko,  Shidlovsky,  and  Madame  Breshkov- 
skaya,  founders  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party ;  to  Isaac 
Hourwich,  Nahum  Stone,  and  James  M.  James,  leaders  among 
the  Russian  Social  Democratic  Party  in  New  York ;  to  Vladimir 
Simkhovitch,  of  Columbia  University ;  to  Prince  Dimitri  Hilkov, 
one  of  the  most  gifted  and  popular  leaders  of  the  whole  revolu- 
tionary movement,  and  most  of  all  to  Bielevsky,  Staal,  and 
Mazurenko,  founders  of  the  great  Peasants'  Union. 

I  have  selected  these  names  somewhat  at  hazard  and  do 
not  wish  to  imply  that  the  list  of  those  to  whom  I  am  most 
indebted  is  exhausted.  I  cannot  leave  the  question  of  my 
indebtedness  without  expressing  my  gratitude  to  other 
prominent  Russians  with  whom  I  have  had  only  single  long 
interviews  or  brief  meetings.  Among  them  are  Tolstoi, 
Gorky,  and  Korolenko;  the  conservative  leaders,  Gutchkov, 
Maklakov,  and  Michael  Stachovitch;  the  Social  Democratic 
leaders.  Parvus,  Dan,  Lenin,  and  Alexinsky ;  the  brilliant  leaders 
of  the  Polish  Socialistic  Party  who  make  their  headquarters  at 
Cracow  —  not  to  speak  of  innumerable  others,  especially  Duma 
members,  editors,  elected  members  of  local  government  boards, 
and  active  organisers  of  all  the  popular  parties,  labour  organisa- 
tions, and  of  the  Union  of  Unions. 

I  have  written  of  course  according  to  the  possibilities  of  the 
moment.  The  time  is  ripe  for  a  general  review  of  the  first 
act  of  the  great  revolutionary  drama.  The  second  act  has  not 
yet  begun  and  it  will  be  years  before  the  whole  drama  has  been 
finished.  A  few  months  ago  it  would  have  been  impossible  to 
gauge  accurately  the  real  intentions  and  policy  of  the  Czar,  the 
court  and  the  Government  after  the  great  events  through  which 
Russia  has  just  passed ;  a  few  years  hence  it  will  be  possible  to 
write  a  full  and  satisfactory  history  at  least  of  a  large  part  of 
the  revolutionary  movement.     In  the  meanwhile,  if  I  have  been 


PREFACE  xiii 

able  to  give  a  general  understanding  of  the  first  act,  to  spread 
the  conviction  that  Russia  has  a  message  for  humanity  and  to 
suggest  what  this  message  contains,  the  reader  will  be  enabled 
to  appreciate  coming  events  at  their  true  value  and  to  feel  that 
the  Russian  struggle  is  not  far  av/ay,  as  we  sometimes  imagine, 
but  nearer  to  us  in  the  end  than  any  of  the  smaller  spectacles 
that  are  taking  place  in  front  of  our  own  doorways. 

Lincoln's  Birthday,  1908. 


CONTENTS 


Preface 


IX 


I. 
II. 


PART  I 

THE    BIRTHPLACE    OF    SOCIAL    FREEDOM 

Why  Russia  is  the  Field  of  the  Great  Experiment 
The  Beginning  —  1904, 1905, 1906, 1907 


3 
10 


PART  II 


OPPRESSION 

I.  Nicholas,  Czar  .... 

II.  How  Czars  Govern 

III.  The  Czarism  Struggling  for  Existence 

IV.  The  Slow  Massacre  System 
V.  Creating  the  "  Internal  Enemy  "  . 

VI.  The  Danger  of  Progress 

VII.  "My  Chief  Support"  . 

VIII.  What  Happened  to  ' *  The  Constitution 

IX.  "  Prussian  "  Reform    . 

X.  Autocracy's  Last  Hope 

XL  The  People's  Enemies  are  the  Czar's  Allies 


29 

32 
40 

51 

59 

70 

80 

88 

100 

112 

126 


PART  III 

REVOLT 

I.  The  Russian  People  —  A  Mystery 

11.  The  Russian  People  —  Their  True  Character 

III.  How  the  Peasants  Live 

IV.  How  the  Peasants  Till  the  Soil 

XV 


145 
153 
166 
180 


RUSSIA'S     MESSAGE 

PART  111  — Continued 

V.     From  Slaves  of  the  Landlord  to  Slaves  of  the  State .  192 

VI.     The  Peasant  Gives  His  Orders       .  .  .  .208 

VII.     How  the  Peasant  Became  a  Revolutionist       .          .  216 

VIII.     The  Village  Against  the  Czar  —  A  State  of  Mind  227 

IX.     The  Czar's  Armies  of  Revenge       ....  235 

X.     The  Village  Against  the  Czar  —  A  State  of  War       .  250 

XL     Waiting  for  Civil  War 261 


PART  IV 

EVOLUTION   OF  A   NEW   NATION 

I. 

The  Nation  United     .          .          . 

271 

II. 

The  Nation  Chooses  the  Revolutionary  Way  . 

.     279 

III. 

The  Unity  Destroyed 

.     287 

IV. 

The  Moderates  Cooperate  with  the  Reactionaries 

•      295 

V. 

Begging  for  Crumbs    ..... 

304 

VI. 

The  Peasants  Become  Socialists    . 

.     312 

VII. 

The  Peasant  Parties  Abandon  Hope  in  the  Duma 

•     327 

VIII. 

The  Leaders  of  the  People    .... 

33^ 

PART  V 

REVOLUTION  AND  THE  MESSAGE 

'I.  The  Workingmen        .... 

II.  The  Position  of  the  Workingmen  . 

III.  Organising         ..... 

IV.  Planning  the  War        .... 
V.  How  the  Priests  are  Becoming  Revolutionists 

VI.     The  Religious  Revolution    . 
VII.     The  Russian  Revolution 
vVIII.     Russia's  Message         .... 


Appendix    . 
Bibliographical  Note 
Index 


349 
358 
371 
382 

392 
402 

413 
428 

468 
469 

473 


XVI 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Count    Tolstoi 

Nicholas  1 1. ,  "  Most  High ' '     . 

Two  high  officials . 

How  the  peasants  are  "  pacified" 

Executing  political  prisoners  . 

The  slayer  of  von  Plehve 

Marie  Spiridonova 

Krushevan,  massacre  organiser 

Reactionary  Duma  members 

Herzenstein  and  Kovalevski  . 

Map  showing  political  divisions  in 

Teaching  the  peasants  . 

A  southern  peasant 

The  landlord's  palace   . 

The  peasant's  cottage    . 

The  earthen  cottage 

The  cottage's  single  room 

A  peasant's  waggon 

Agricultural  implements 

Peasants  in  winter  costume 

Famine-stricken  peasants 

Methods  of  threshing     . 

Haying  done  by  women 

Bogoraz  (Tan) ,  the  poet 

Korolenko,  the  novelist 

The  village  chief  . 

A  wise  peasant 

The  village  street 

Social  farming  of  the  peasantry 

Little  Russian  peasants . 

Professor  Milyoukov 

Constitutional  Democratic  leaders 

Labour  Group  of  first  Duma   . 

xvii 


Russia 


Frontispiece 

22 

23 
48 

49 
64 

65 
80 
81 
96 

97 
162 
165 
174 
175 
178 
179 
190 
191 
192 

193 
208 
209 
340 
240- 
241 
241 
256 
256 

257 
276 
277 
284 


RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 


Social  Democratic  deputies     . 

2S5 

Executive  Committee  of  Peasants'  Union 

294 

Cossack  liberals    .          .          .          .          .     . 

29s 

A  young  village  leader   . 

298 

Peasants'  Union  delegates     . 

299 

Peasant  members  of  the  Duma 

326 

An  educated  peasant  leader    . 

327 

Anikine        ..... 

330 

Aladdin       ..... 

330 

Bielevsky ,  under  "  house  arrest  *' 

331 

Father  Gapon 

356 

Type  of  working  man     . 

357 

A  corner  of  old  Moscow . 

364 

Prince  Kropotkin 

36s 

Socialist  Revolutionary  leaders 

.     384 

Two  types  of  village  priests     . 

38s 

Fathers  Petrov  and  Kolokolnikov 

400 

Two  types  of  the  higher  clergy 

401 

xvin 


PART  ONE 

The  Birthplace  of  Social  Freedom 


OF  THE     ^>^ 

DIVERSITY 


OF 


CHAPTER  I 

WHY  RUSSIA  IS    THE  FIELD   OF   THE  GREAT  EXPERIMENT 

ON  THE  banks  of  the  Neva,  the  Volga,  and  the  Vistula," 
writes  Anatole  France,  "the  fate  of  new  Europe  and 
the  future  of  humanity  are  being  decided." 
/    The  future  of  humanity  is  being  decided  in  Russia  because 
fit  is  Russia  alone  among  the  great  nations  that  has  not  already 
\definitely  chosen  the  path  of  her  development.     The  foundations 
of  modem  industry  were  laid  in  Great  Britain  more  than  a  cen- 
tury ago,  the  political  institutions  of  America  have  undergone 
no   revolution   for   more   than   a   hundred   years.     The   other 
modem  nations  also  are  held  fast  in  the  framework  of  material 
and  political  conditions  fixed  by  some  long-dead  generation. 
In  this  sense  Russia  is  comparatively  free.     Without  being  out 
of  touch  with  modem  life  she  is  not  bound  by  any  of  the  peculiar 
limitations  of  the  other  nations. 

i  She  is  almost  entirely  free  from  those  great  business  interests 
that  dominate  the  life  of  other  modem  nations.  Witte  has 
tried  the  great  experiment  of  turning  Russia  into  a  modem 
business  nation  by  means  of  ukases  of  the  Czar  and  the  division 
of  his  plunder  and  the  country's  wealth  with  foreign  capital. 
The  result  was  the  collapse  in  1 900  of  the  whole  artificial  indus- 
trial structure  based  on  the  taxation  of  the  starving  peasantry. 
The  recent  parliamentary  experiment  is  also  ended  and  the 
shadow  of  a  constitution  has  disappeared.  The  Government 
i  is  once  more  a  despotism  that  leaves  neither  power  nor  freedom 
to  the  people. 

Neither  by  political  education,  then,  nor  by  economic  neces- 
sity are  the  Russians  tied  to  any  one  of  the  industrial  and 
political  institutions  that  characterise  other  peoples  of  our 
time,  nor  are  they  in  any  way  wedded  to  an  effete  and  outworn 
^civilisation.  The  Czarism  is  a  half -Asiatic,  half -German  insti- 
tution imposed  on  the  coxmtry  from  without,  just  as  the  Church 

3 


4  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

was  bodily  transported  from  Constantinople  and  set  up  without 
the  slightest  reference  to  religious  ideas  then  in  existence. 
We  have  the  judgment  indeed  of  one  of  Russia's  greatest  histo- 
rians and  sociologists,  of  the  man  who  led  the  party  that  con- 
j|  trolled  both  of  the  first  two  Dumas,  to  the  effect  that  Russia  is 

^^  I  indeed  without  any  national  religious  or  political  tradition 
in  the  truest  sense  of  the  word. 

Scratch  a  Russian  and  you  find  not  a  Tartar  but  a  new 
European.  Old  institutions  are  hated  rather  than  venerated. 
There  is  no  question  among  any  important  element  of  the 
population  outside  of  the  relative  handful  that  supports  the 
Czar,  of  not  leaving  the  landmarks  of  Russia  with  all  speed. 
Russia's  unparalleled  tragedy  is  not  due  to  any  innate  conser- 
vatism in  the  national  character,  not  to  the  grip  on  the  people's 
soul  of  old  customs  and  an  old  faith,  but  to  an  incredible  incubus 
that  has  been  imposed  upon  her  from  without  and  like  a  mon- 
strous parasite  has  grown  strong  at  the  expense  of  all  her 
best  vital  forces. 

"The  Russian,"  said  Turgeniev,  "is  so  convinced  of  his 
own  strength  and  powers  that  he  is  not  afraid  of  putting  himself 
to  severe  strain.  He  takes  little  interest  in  his  past  and  looks 
boldly  forward.  What  is  good  (in  his  own  past  or  that  of  other 
nations)  he  likes,  what  is  sensible  he  will  have,  and  where  it 
comes  from  he  does  not  care." 

y  "The  old  is  dead,  the  new  is  not  yet  born,"  says  an  old  Russian 
proverb.  It  portrays  the  present  condition  of  the  country. 
The  old  Russian  system  of  slavery  and  despotism  is  already  dead 
in  the  minds  and  hearts  of  the  people  because  enslavement 
either  to  private  individuals  or  to  the  State  wholly  contradicts 
every  thought  and  feeling  of  the  Russian,  as  of  every  thinking 
and  feeling  man  who  knows  of  any  other  mode  of  existence. 
The  new  is  not  yet  bom  because  of  the  greatness  of  the  changes 
that  are  coming  into  being.  It  is  not  merely  a  revolutionary 
change  in  land  ownership  or  a  new  government  that  is  demanded. 
It  is,  to  employ  an  expression  now  widely  in  use  among  all  classes, 

^  ""new  forms  of  life,"  new  forms  of  national  and  individual 
existence.  The  peasants  want  the  land  and  the  nation  wants 
to  rule  itself,  not  because  conditions  are  growing  worse,  not  so 
much  because  they  are  inspired  with  the  horror  of  what  now 


RUSSIA   THE   FIELD   OF    EXPERIMENT  5 

prevails,  as  because  they  are  filled  with  a  sense  of  the  greatness 
that  is  possible  to  a  regenerated  Russia. 

Here  is  a  great  people  in  possession  of  half  the  continents 
of  Europe  and  Asia,  a  people  unhampered  by  inherent  traditions, 
that  has  yet  never  experienced  a  great  national  awakening  like 
other  countries.  Every  thoughtful  or  enterprising  Russian 
feels  that  in  a  well  ordered  society  there  would  be  room  for 
his  development.  Every  peasant  knows  of  the  better  conditions 
and  opportunities  of  America  and  Western  Europe.  Every 
educated  person  has  read  and  thought  over  what  is  desirable 
and  undesirable  for  Russia  in  this  "Western  life."  Every 
trained  person,  publicist,  artisan,  professional  or  business  man, 
has  studied,  planned  and  dreamed  over  the  technical  revolution 
already  accomplished  in  other  countries  that  is  called  for  also 
in  his  occupation  in  Russia.  But  all  feel  that  the  absence  of  any 
real  tradition  in  Russia,  the  long  pent-up  energies  and  revolution- 
ary spirit  in  all  things,  should  ultimately  give  her  an  advantage 
over  the  other  countries,  and  sweep  away  many  of  the  obstacles 
to  individual  and  national  development  that  exist  in  other 
lands  either  because  their  advanced  economic  condition  has  set 
them  in  the  hard  and  fast  lines  of  a  fixed  material  and  institu- 
tional framework,  or  because  some  popular,  but  none  the  less 
blind,  political  tradition  has  been  allowed  to  sink  its  roots  in  the 
minds  of  the  people. 

The  evil  Russia  is  fighting  does  not  exist,  then,  in  the  charac- 
ter of  the  nation  itself,  as  a  thing  of  the  spirit,  but  as  an  arbitrary 
physical  power.  Nevertheless,  the  struggle  of  the  new  against 
the  old  Russia  is  not  merely  a  physical  conflict.  The  people's 
cause  has  long  ago  attained  a  strength  sufficiently  great  to  force 
the  Government  to  break  its  silence  and  to  cover  its  selfish, 
irresponsible,  and  anti-social  action,  often  consciously  hostile 
to  the  general  welfare,  by  a  whole  universe  of  lies.  To  every 
appeal  from  glaring  wrongs  to  reason,  to  justice,  to  the  nation's 
welfare,  or  even  to  the  most  elementary  rights  of  the  individual, 
the  Government's  answer  is  —  some  falsehood. 

Official  Russia  is  in  a  land  of  lies.  The  Czar  lies  as  to  facts 
in  signed  documents,  breaks  his  most  solemn  promises  to  the 
nation,  and,  finally,  diabolically  proclaims  his  God-given  right 
to  break  his  word.     The  ministers  lie  to  the  Duma  and  the  Duma 


6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

fully  exposes  their  lies.  To  retrieve  its  own  national  reputation 
lost  in  the  war  with  Japan,  the  Government  tries  to  throw  the 
blame  on  the  Manchurian  generals  and  finally  convicts  them, 
apparently  with  justice,  of  every  manner  of  fraud  and  degrada- 
tion, even  to  telegraphing  in  official  despatches  of  battles  that 
were  never  fought.  Every  financial  statement  the  Government 
has  issued  has  been  proved  by  the  experts  of  Europe  to  be  only 
a  cleverly  managed  collection  of  misstatements.  All  the  tele- 
grams allowed  to  be  printed  in  Russia  are  those  of  the  Govern- 
ment agency,  and  every  day  proves  some  of  them  to  be  either 
lying  half-truths  or  falsehoods. 

Each  of  these  lies  covers  a  wrong.  With  the  growth  of  the 
revolutionary  movement  all  wrong-doers  and  parasites  enjoying 
a  wrongful  or  unearned  income  are  herding  together  for  defence. 
Whether  the  incompetent  person  is  professor,  administrator, 
engineer,  or  priest,  whether  the  dishonest  wrong-doer  is  official, 
banker,  or  landlord,  makes  little  difference.  They  are  all 
connected  with  the  Governnient.  The  ramifications  of  the 
governmental  power  are  numberless  and  few  are  the  unscrupu- 
lous that  have  not  secured  some  kind  of  protection  or  benefit. 
It  would  seem  that  there  is  nothing  too  old,  too  outworn,  too 
repugnant  to  all  humanity  and  reason,  whether  in  government, 
religion,  education,  or  science,  for  the  Czar  to  cover  with  the 
Imperial  sanction. 

The  struggle  is  not  being  carried  out  on  a  physical  plane,  largely 
because  all  the  best  life  of  the  nation  is  absorbed  in  exposing 
this  great  system  of  falsehood.  And  as  the  hard-pressed  Govern- 
ment takes  shelter  at  one  time  or  another  behind  nearly  every 
one  of  the  most  used  and  dangerous  lies  that  are  oppressing 
humanity  and  have  oppressed  it  for  centuries,  the  leaders  of  the 
nation  on  their  side  have  been  forced  to  draw  into  the  discussion 
all  the  greatest  and  most  illuminating  truths  of  history  and  of 
[our  time.  The  more  hopeless  the  outlook  for  the  immediate 
success  of  the  revolution,  the  more  enthusiastic,  impassioned, 
many-sided  and  profound  has  been  the  public  discussion  of 
every  far-reaching  social  problem,  until  it  can  now  be^  said 
though  she  is  without  a  vestige  of  political  liberty  that  Russia 
is  more  vitally  alive  to  every  great  political  and  social  issue 
than  the  freest  countries.     In  the  brief  periods  of  relative  free- 


RUSSIA   THE   FIELD   OF    EXPERIMENT  7 

dom  of  the  press  that  have  occurred  several  times  during  these 
revolutionary  years  no  great  problem  of  human  destiny  was 
left  unstirred.  All  arguments,  all  philosophies,  all  history, 
the  experience  of  all  countries  were  dragged  into  the  arena. 
Because  nothing  is  settled  in  the  nation's  life,  because  the  people 
are  clamouring  for  everything  that  for  generations  may  have 
been  denied,  and  because  all  great  questions  are  under  discussion, 
nothing  can  be  taken  for  granted  in  the  argument.  So  there 
are  marshaled  in  opposing  camps  in  Russia  all  the  forces  of 
progress  and  reaction  as  in  no  other  country  during  all  the 
century  that  has  elapsed  since  the  revolution  in  France. 

The  issues  of  this  revolution  are  greater  than  they  were  in 
France,  the  struggle  is  on  a  more  extended  scale,  and  the  whole  ^ 
world  is  lending  its  forces  to  aid  the  Russian  Government. 
The  foreign  influence  that  threatened  the  French  Revolution 
through  the  English  fleet  and  the  Prussian  and  Austrian  armies 
on  the  frontier,  which  finally  forced  the  Revolution  to  choose 
between  Napoleon's  military  dictatorship  and  extinction,  is 
represented  in  the  very  heart  of  Russian  life  by  the  apparently 
inexhaustible  supply  of  gold  by  means  of  which  foreign  money- 
lenders enabled  the  Government  to  provide  itself  with  all  the 
formidable  machinery  of  modem  warfare  and  to  hire  an  army  of 
nearly  a  million  Cossacks  and  police  to  hold  down  the  revolu- 
tionary movement.  The  Russian  revolution  is  in  no  sense 
only  a  Russian  question.  It  is  against  the  financial  powers  ^ 
of  all  the  world  that  the  revolutionists  are  fighting.  This  is 
why  Russia's  most  profound  thinkers  cannot  see  an  early  end 
to  the  upheaval  —  though  the  whole  world  will  benefit  from  ' 
their  victory. 

I  saw  Count  Tolstoi  just  after  the  meeting  of  the  first  Duma, 
and  told  him  I  had  come  to  spend  several  years  to  observe  the 
revolution.  "  You  had  better  stay  here  fifty  years,"  he  answered. 
"The  revolution  is  a  drama  of  several  acts.  This  Duma  is  not 
even  the  first  act,  but  only  the  first  scene  of  the  first  act,  and  as 
is  usual  with  first  scenes  it  is  a  trifle  comic." 

If  the  revolution  is  long  drawn  out,  if  the  losses  are  great, 
if  the  Czarism  seems  to  be  holding  its  power,  this  is  only  because 
new  forces  have  been  thrown  into  the  balance,  and  means  that 
a  still  greater  battle  will  have  to  be  fought,  a  battle  that  may 


8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

V     become    what   Carlyle    called   the    French    Revolution,    "the 
account  day  of  a  thousand  years." 

But  in  order  to  realise  what  is  going  on  it  is  not  necessary  to 
wait  for  the  final  fruition  of  the  great  movement.  The  soul 
Wof  the  future  civilisation  is  foreshadowed  in  the  conflict.  The 
rising  generation,  the  youth  and  even  most  men  under  middle 
age,  those  who  will  constitute  the  chief  force  of  Russia  in  another 
decade,  are  nothing  less  than  inspired  by  the  revolution.  Their 
devotion  goes  further  than  that  of  mere  patriots  engaged  in 
foreign  wars;  they  imdergo  denials,  sufferings  and  actual  tortures 
that  make  them  more  akin  to  religious  martyrs.  Patriots  die 
freely  in  battle  for  their  country  —  these  enthusiasts  submit 
to  a  whole  life  of  unrewarded  sacrifice.  The  vast  majority  of 
the  young  men  of  every  social  class  except  the  most  privileged, 
and  a  large  part  of  the  educated  young  women  as  well,  are  daily 
offering  their  lives,  their  liberty,  their  property  and  their  future 
careers  for  the  cause.  Their  leading  motive  is  not  hatred  of 
the  enemy,  nor  perhaps  even  love  of  their  own  friends  and 
kindred,  so  much  as  the  political  principles  and  social  ideals 
'  to  which  they  have  given  all  their  most  serious  thoughts.  The 
t  more  thoughtful,  active,  and  capable  the  young  people,  the  more 
immersed  we  find  them  in  the  revolutionary  movement.  Nor 
do  they  leave  it  with  growing  years.  The  revolutionists  of  the 
former  generation  have  for  the  most  part  remained  steadfastly 
attached  to  their  faith,  and  each  of  the  great  parties  is  still  led 
by  the  last  even  more  than  by  the  present  generation.  Neither 
must  it  be  inferred  that  it  is  altogether  different  with  the  fathers 
of  the  rank  and  file.  As  usual  in  wars  or  revolutions  their 
positions  and  family  cares  do  not  permit  them  to  bear  the  brunt 
of  the  movement,  the  active  parts  are  necessarily  taken  by  the 
yotmg,  but  the  parents  often  encourage,  and  rarely  interfere 
with,  their  children's  activities. 

It  is  perhaps  the  first  time  in  history  that  a  whole  nation 
has  been  infected  to  the  point  of  religious  enthusiasm  by  this 
purely  social  faith.  Something  like  this  occurred  in  France. 
But  as  the  revolution  there  did  not  meet  a  tithe  of  the  obstacles 
that  this  one  has  already  met,  it  did  not  develop  a  tithe  of  the 
intensity,  profundity,  or  universal  scope  of  the  present  move- 
ment.     This  is  why   so    many    great    thinkers   feel  that  the 


RUSSIA   THE   FIELD   OF    EXPERIMENT  9 

Russian  revolution  means  more  to  humanity  than  any  great 
popular  movement,  political,  economic,  or  religious,  that  all 
history  records. 

As  regenerated  Russia,  inspired  by  her  victory  and  with 
the  spiritual  strength  and  character  gained  through  the  struggle, 
steps  finally  into  the  arena  of  the  modem  nations  and  faces 
the  same  situation  as  the  rest,  she  is  likely  to  lead  in  her  solutions 
rather  than  to  follow,  to  inspire  rather  than  to  act  as  a  drag 
upon  the  others.  Her  poverty,  her  inexperience,  her  miserable 
past,  will  give  to  her  young  men  the  same  stimulation  as  they 
have  to  our  own,  who  in  struggling  against  precisely  such 
obstacles  have  created  the  greatness  of  the  United  States. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  BEGINNING  —  1904,  1905,  1906,  1907 

IN  THE  brief  space  of  four  years  Russia  has  gone  through 
the  experience  of  a  generation:  the  war  with  Japan;  the 
broken  promises  of  the  Czar  and  the  false  constitutional  hopes 
of  a  part  of  the  people ;  the  indefinite  postponement  of  the  once 
impending  bankruptcy;  the  failure  of  passive  resistance  called 
for  by  the  national  assembly,  of  the  second  great  general  strike, 
of  the  insurrections  in  the  cities,  of  the  agrarian  uprisings 
in  the  country,  and  of  the  imposing  mutinies  on  sea  and  land  to 
shake  off  the  hated  Czar.  The  guerilla  war  and  the  killing 
of.  the  most  murderous  officials  by  mortally  injured  and  mad- 
dened citizens  continue  to  cost  the  Government  dear,  but  the  very 
persons  engaged  in  this  kind  of  warfare  know  that  by  it  alone 
the  Czarism  can  never  be  overthrown.  The  people's  parties  are 
powerless  and  insignificant  in  the  third  Duma,  but  they  have 
succeeded  in  planting  their  doctrines  everywhere  and  even  in 
partly  organising  the  masses  of  the  population.  The  three 
Dumas  and  the  revolutionary  movement  have  brought  no  great 
improvements  in  the  political  freedom  or  the  economic  condition 
of  the  people.  But  they  have  already  brought  the  Russian 
problem  before  the  whole  world,  and  revolutionised  Russian 
life,  thought,  and  opinion. 

It  was  at  the  beginning  of  war  with  Japan  that  the  foreign 
press  first  directed  its  attention  to  Russia's  internal  affairs. 
The  spectacular  failure  of  the  Russian  arms  in  Manchuria, 
however,  shed  little  light  on  the  internal  conditions  of  European 
Russia  nearly  ten  thousand  miles  away.  One  particular  fact, 
though,  was  made  evident.  From  the  events  in  Russia  at  this 
time  it  was  clear  to  all  the  world  that  a  large  part  of  the  people 
of  all  classes  was  opposed  to  the  war.  The  leading  newspapers, 
gagged  as  they  were,  managed  to  attack  the  war  and  the  Govern- 
ment; and  the  troops  began  almost   immediately  to  revolt. 

10 


THE    BEGINNING  ii 

The  world  learned  that  the  Russian  people  had  not  brought 
on  this  war. 

The  real  cause  of  the  war  soon  developed.  It  became  clear 
that  the  terrible  conflict  was  brought  on  chiefly  to  further  the 
private  interests  of  the  Grand  Dukes,  Admiral  Alexis,  and  other 
favourites  of  the  court,  A  quarter  of  a  million  lives  had  been 
destroyed  and  a  sum  calculated  by  a  leading  economist  at  four 
or  five  billion  rubles,  a  tenth  of  the  total  wealth  of  this  impov- 
erished people,  had  been  destroyed.  The  whole  world  then  for 
the  first  time  realised  that  the  Russian  Government  is  indeed  a 
barbarous  despotism,  that  it  is  sustained  by  violence,  that  the 
welfare  of  the  people  is  subordinated  to  the  interests  of  those 
who  happen  to  be  pleasing  to  the  Czar.  The  true  nature  of  the 
Czarism  was  probably  as  plain  at  that  moment  as  it  will  ever  be. 
All  the  other  horrors,  the  massacre  of  the  St.  Petersburg  workmen 
on  January  22,  1905,  the  innumerable  massacres  of  the  Jews 
instigated  by  the  police,  the  butcheries  of  Tartars,  Armenians, 
and  Poles  in  peaceful  assemblies,  the  deliberate  burning  of  a 
theatre  full  of  educated  people  at  Tomsk,  however  terrible  to 
the  foreign  reader,  were,  taken  all  together,  hardly  so  costly  to 
the  Russian  people,  hardly  so  significant  of  their  enslaved 
condition,  as  the  spectacle  of  a  nation  of  a  hundred  and  forty 
million  people  being  driven  by  their  despot  to  war  against 
another  people  ten  thousand  miles  away  of  whom  they  knew 
little  and  against  whom  they  had  conceived  no  grievance. 

The  events  of  the  last  three  years  (1905,  1906,  1907)  are 
surely  enough  to  show  that  there  is  no  hope  of  this  incredible 
and  monstrous  despotism  reforming  itself.  Russia  has  listened 
to  the  Czar's  broken  promises  for  more  than  a  generation.  But 
the  promises  of  the  last  three  years  have  been  heard  one  after 
another  by  the  whole  world.  In  October,  1905,  the  Czar  prom- 
ised a  Duma  and  freedom  and  equality  before  the  law.  At 
present  all  continues  as  before :  newspapers  are  confiscated  and 
suppressed ;  every  kind  of  -meeting  forbidden ;  Jews  and  Poles 
persecuted  for  their  religion  and  nationality;  workingmen  and 
peasants  arrested  by  the  wholesale  for  striking;  hundreds  of 
speakers,  writers,  students  and  working  people  sent  every  day, 
without  trial,  to  prison,  hard  labour,  and  Siberia;  the  starving 
\  peasantry  crushed  by  the  same  overwhelming  burden  of  taxes, 


12  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

and  the  Duma  abolished  in  all  but  name.  The  third  Duma  is 
entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  landlords,  the  sole  important  ele- 
ment of  the  nation  outside  of  Government  employees  on  which 
the  Czar  can  now  rely  for  loyal  support  —  about  one  per  cent, 
of  the  population. 

It  is  not  a  question  of  reform  in  Russia  but  of  revolution. 
The  reader  does  not  need  to  be  reminded  how  large  a  part  of 
the  Russian  people  are  of  this  opinion.  Tens  of  thousands 
have  died  for  it,  hundreds  of  thousands  gone  to  prison  or  exile, 
millions  suffered  persecution,  fines  and  arrest.  Tens  of  millions 
of  Russians  who  do  not  happen  to  have  been  individually 
persecuted  share  their  view.  In  the  election  an  overwhelming 
majority  of  the  people  voted  for  representatives  of  the  revolu- 
tionary factions.  It  was  only  a  most  unequal  suffrage  and 
unheard  of  arbitrariness  of  the  officials  that  gave  the  moderately 
oppositional  parties  a  bare  majority.  It  will  be  remembered 
that  this  election  law,  though  by  no  means  distorted  enough 
to  give  a  Government  majority  and  now  replaced  by  one  infi- 
nitely less  democratic,  nevertheless  gave  the  noble  landlord  the 
same  number  of  votes  as  a  hundred  peasants.  And  it  will 
be  recalled  that  voters  and  electors  were  publicly  disqualified 
by  the  hundred  thousand  at  all  stages  of  the  election  for  nothing 
more  subversive  than  unfriendliness  to  the  Government.  But 
it  is  not  generally  realised  that  nevertheless  an  overwhelming 
majority  of  the  votes  cast  were  votes  for  revolution. 

The  intelligent  newspaper  reader  is  well  aware  that  every 
attempt  at  revolution  has  failed  to  gain  any  concrete  results, 
whether  general  strike,  insurrection,  mutiny,  refusal  of  taxes 
and  recruits,  assassination  of  despots,  guerilla  war,  or  even  the 
most  peaceful  parliamentary  method  of  refusing  to  countenance 
the  foreign  loans  on  which  the  Government  is  absolutely  depen- 
dent for  every  year  of  its  continued  existence.  The  general 
strike,  which  won  the  Czar's  idle  promise  of  reform,  the  well 
known  Manifesto*  of  October,  1905,  was  carried  to  success  by 
two  causes  that  can  hardly  recur  again  —  the  unpreparedness 
of  the  Government,  and  the  unity  of  the  people.  The  strike 
was  begun  on  the  railroads  and  its  effect  was  almost  wholly 
due  to  the  tying  up  of  all  the  communication  of  the  country. 

*  For  the  full  text  of  this  Manifesto  see  Appendix,  Note  A. 


THE    BEGINNING  13 

The  Government  has  now  organized  the  railroads  on  the  Prus- 
sian military  system  and  made  it  an  offence  punishable  by 
immediate  execution  to  have  anything  to  do  with  a  railway 
strike.  After  the  passing  of  this  law  a  second  effort  to  strike, 
in  December,  1905,  proved  an  almost  complete  failure.  This 
was  partly  due  to  the  preparedness  of  the  Government,  partly 
to  the  hostility  or  indifference  of  a  part  of  the  population.  The 
Railway  Union  in  Siberia  felt  itself  forced  to  leave  the  lines  open 
to  send  the  troops  home  from  Manchuria.  The  troops  in  Man- 
churia, though  sympathetic  with  the  revolt,  were  more  anxious 
to  get  home  a  few  weeks  earlier  than  to  further  the  cause.  In 
another  section  the  imion  felt  compelled  to  forward  grain  to  the 
famine-stricken  peasants.  The  peasants  were  sympathetic  but 
not  enough  so  to  withstand  a  few  more  weeks  of  a  state  of  siege 
for  the  sake  of  permanent  freedom.  The  railway  men  knew 
then,  and  have  since  finally  decided,  that  a  strike  can  succeed 
against  the  courts-martial  only  if  the  communications  are 
completely  interrupted  and  the  bridges  as  far  as  possible  de- 
stroyed. They  propose  to  wait  until  some  large  section  of  the 
peasants  rises  in  revolt.  The  general  strike  depends  then  on  the 
general  insurrection. 

But  the  general  insurrection  has  also  been  tried  and  foimd 
wanting.  The  Moscow  barricades  certainly  proved  an  imex- 
pected  and  brilliant  success  at  the  outset,  and  this  success  was 
repeated  at  a  nimiber  of  other  places.  But  no  unity  of  action 
developed  between  the  various  points.  The  railroads  remained 
almost  intact  and  the  Government  was  able  to  send  reinforce- 
ments wherever  it  was  hard  pressed.  In  the  meanwhile  the 
revolutionists  failed  to  get  on  their  side  a  sufficiently  large  part 
of  the  army  at  any  one  point  to  be  able  to  march  to  the  rescue 
of  their  comrades. 

,  The  agrarian  insurrections  were  even  more  isolated  and 
fruitless.  Numbering  on  the  whole  several  thousand,  they  were 
yet  so  disconnected  that  never  were  more  than  a  handful  of 
villages  able  to  act  in  concert.  A  hundred  million  rubles  worth 
of  landlords*  property  was  destroyed,  here  and  there  an  official 
was  killed.  Yet  there  was  no  call  for,  nor  support  of,  a  general 
railroad  strike,  the  only  measure  that  could  have  confimed  the 
loyal  part  of  the  troops  to  the  cities  and  allowed  time  for  the 


14  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

organisation  of  the  agrarian  revolt.  Again,  in  the  summer  of 
1907,  after  the  dissolution  of  the  second  and  last  real  Duma,  the 
whole  of  the  southern  part  of  the  country  was  covered  with 
agrarian  revolts,  but  again  these  revolts  were  never  so  general 
as  to  be  too  much  for  the  relatively  few  loyal  troops,  the  Cossacks 
'.  and  mounted  rural  police.  If  the  day  should  ever  arrive  when 
these  revolts  become  general  in  any  section,  the  Railroad  Union, 
sure  then  of  the  support  and  aid  of  the  people,  promises  a  strike 
accompanied  by  the  destruction  of  the  lines.  This  would  cer- 
tainly leave  the  country  districts  in  the  people's  hands.  The 
half  a  million  mounted  soldiers  who  happen  for  the  most  part 
to  be  loyal  would  be  as  nothing  spread  over  a  large  section  of 
the  country. 

Events  have  shown  conclusively  that  most  of  the  peasant 
/  infantry  in  the  towns  are  infected  and  that  some  are  ready  for 
'  mutiny  or  desertion.  But  there  remains  the  semi-professional 
army  of  Cossacks  and  guards,  and  this  has  been  the  one  great 
safeguard  of  the  throne.  The  relatively  few  revolts  among  the 
loyal  professional,  and  one  might  almost  say  standing,  army 
have  of  course  been  made  the  most  of  by  the  revolutionists. 
But  such  mutinies  have  been  directed  often  merely  against  the 
miserable  food,  and  unnecessary  regulations  or  discipline.  The 
Czar  has  quickly  realised  the  necessity  of  giving  these  soldiers 
no  such  causes  of  discontent.  Their  food  has  been  entirely 
altered,  their  pay  increased,  their  service  eased  and  especially 
compensated  in  times  of  "campaigns  against  the  internal 
enemy."  The  regiments  of  the  guard  were  favoured  in  every 
way,  stationed  at  the  most  important  and  interesting  places, 
clothed,  fed,  paid,  and  treated  better  than  the  rest.  The  mem- 
bers of  these  regiments  had  been  chosen  from  all  the  recruits, 
not  only  on  account  of  their  physical  development,  but  also 
because  of  loyalty  and  zeal. 

The  Cossacks  are  even  more  favoured  among  the  subjects 
of  the  Czar.  They  are  truly  professional  soldiers  and  the  chil- 
dren of  paid  fighters.  Living  in  outlying  parts  of  the  country 
the  Czar  has  devoted  to  their  use  for  several  generations,  they 
are  given  every  privilege  the  Government  can  afford  -Aplenty 
of  land,  low  taxes,  and  even  local  freedom  to  govern  themselves. 
They  are  not  forced  conscripts  like  the  rest  of  the  Czar's  forces 


THE   BEGINNING  15 

and  all  the  great  armies  of  to-day.  They  are  well  paid  to  follow 
the  profession  their  fathers  freely  chose  before  them.  Their 
privileged  position  puts  them  socially  apart  somewhere  between 
the  nobility  and  the  common  people.  Without  having  the  inde- 
pendent military  power  of  the  Janissaries  or  Pretorian  guards, 
they  are  as  much  the  indispensable  prop  of  a  detested  govern- 
ment as  were  the  mercenaries  of  the  old  Empires  of  Constanti- 
nople or  Rome. 

The  reader  has  often  noticed  the  undoubted  zest  with  which 
these  Cossacks  have  filled  their  murderous  office,  and  he  has 
doubtless  felt  the  hopelessness  of  inspiring  such  bom  servants 
of  despotism  with  devotion  to  the  people.  If  he  remembers 
that  the  Cossacks*  privileges  would  also  vanish  with  the  institu- 
tion of  a  people's  army  and  a  more  democratic  government, 
he  will  understand  from  the  Cossack  problem  alone  that  the  revo- 
lution has  before  it  a  task  greater  than  that  ever  faced  by  any 
people  fighting  for  freedom.  An  impoverished  and  unarmed 
people  spread  out  in  little  isolated  villages  and  towns  over  half 
Europe  and  half  Asia  has  to  face  a  modem  army  of  half  a  million 
men,  mostly  hereditary  fighters,  perhaps  the  best  horsemen  in 
the  world,  well  paid  and  rewarded,  splendidly  armed  and  disci- 
plined, hated  by  the  mass  of  the  people  and  naturally  returning 
with  contempt  this  hatred,  prepared  by  special  schooling  and 
the  careful  tutelage  of  their  officers  to  despise  democracy  and 
peace,  to  love  Czarism  and  war,  already  experienced  in,  and  now 
thoroughly  reorganised  for  the  express  purpose  of,  putting  down 
revolt.  It  is  this  army  paid  by  the  money  advanced  by  the 
financiers  of  Germany  and  France,  that  has  checked  the  revolu- 
tion. It  is  the  activity  of  this  army  that  explains  why  the 
peasant  uprisings  limited  to  a  few  thousand  villages  scattered 
over  the  land  did  not  take  hold  of  the  others  and  result,  as  in 
France  in  1789,  in  the  driving  of  the  last  landlord  out  of  the 
country.  It  was  this  army  that  suppressed  the  growing  mutiny 
among  the  troops  in  every  comer  of  the  land.  It  was  this  army 
that  recaptured  the  few  towns  and  strongholds  that  fell  into 
the  people's  hands  and  prevented  the  peasants  and  small  towns 
from  imifying  their  movements  as  was  done  by  the  federations 
in  France,  which  organised  a  government  that  was  able  to  defend 
itself  for  twenty  years  against  the  allied  forces  of  all  Europe. 


i6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  peaceful  measures  of  revolt,  as  I  have  said,  were  no  more 
successful.  The  failure  to  get  a  foreign  loan  would  have  forced 
the  Government  to  yield  —  but  the  people's  opposition  to  the 
loan  availed  nothing.  In  December,  1906,  the  Government 
reports  showed  that  the  country's  finances  were  only  a  few 
million  rubles,  or  a  few  days  from  paper  money  and  ruin.  The 
financial  situation  may  indeed  overwhelm  the  Government 
in  another  generation,  but  if  aljowed  to  reach  that  point  it 
might  first  overwhelm  the  natioii  in  utter  impoverishment  and 
economic  ruin. 

The  only  other  "peaceful"  means  of  forcing  the  Government 
to  terms  were  those  appealed  to  by  the  first  Duma  when  it  was 
dissolved.  The  celebrated  Viborg  manifesto,*  signed  by  a 
majority  of  the  people's  representatives,  called  for  every  possible 
means  of  passive  resistance,  denounced  the  foreign  loans,  and 
proposed  to  the  people  to  refuse  taxes  and  recruits.  These 
latter  measures,  certainly  passive,  could  not  long  have  remained 
peaceful.  If  the  Duma's  advice  had  been  followed  by  any 
considerable  proportion  of  the  people,  the  savage  and  universal 
reprisals  of  the  Government  would  inevitably  have  led  to  open 
outbreaks.  The  villagers  that  refused  recruits  were  at  once 
taken  before  the  courts-martial,  which  were  the  supreme  power 
in  the  country  from  that  time,  and  punished  by  military  "law." 
Both  the  people  and  the  majority  of  the  Duma  members  who 
had  signed  the  manifesto,  were  thoroughly  aware  of  the  impos- 
sibility of  a  general  insurrection.  The  people  refused  to  take 
the  first  step  where  a  second  was  out  of  the  question,  the  moder- 
ate party  within  a  few  weeks  repudiated  the  proposal  they 
themselves  had  put  forward,  and  passive  resistance  is  no  longer 
talked  of  as  a  means  of  liberating  the  land. 

So  far  all  the  means  of  revolution  have  failed.  But  more 
remarkable  than  their  failure  is  the  way  the  people  have  taken 
their  defeat.  The  reader  must  have  noticed  that  the  revolu- 
tionary spirit  has  lived  on  even  after  the  hope  of  any  kind  of 
immediate  and  general  movement  had  failed.  All  the  more 
determined  revolutionists  have  decided  that  the  spark  of  revolt 
shall  be  kept  alive  until  a  way  is  found  to  inflame  the  nation  to 
a  final  heroic  and  successful  stand.     Assassination,  expropria- 

*  For  text  of  the  Viborg  Manifesto  see  Appendix,  Note  C. 


THE   BEGINNING  17 

tion  and  guerilla  war  are  on  the  decrease  because  they  are  not 
leading  to  the  general  movement  their  partisans  had  hoped  — 
and  the  current  has  set  against  them  as  means  of  leading  up  to  a 
general  revolt.  But  confidence  in  Russia's  future  and  undying 
hatred  to  the  Government  have  driven  the  people  to  ever  new 
and  more  successful  forms  of  action,  slower,  more  costly  perhaps, 
but  irresistible  in  the  end.  Some  of  the  measures  of  repression 
still  in  effect  are  proving  fruitless,  and  when  the  Government 
does  successfully  maintain  its  might  it  does  so  at  the  cost  of  mak- 
ing new  enemies  it  can  ill  afford,  or  of  a  financial  expenditure 
that  must  lead  to  a  steady  decay  of  its  power. 

The  reader  must  have  realised  that  the  new  election  law  by 
which  the  voice  of  the  people  in  the  third  Duma  is  reduced 
almost  to  zero,  while  the  nobility  and  landlords,  scarcely  one  per 
cent,  of  the  voters,  are  given  a  majority  of  the  representatives, 
amounts  practically  to  an  abolition  of  the  national  parliament. 
He  may,  therefore,  have  concluded  not  only  that  the  revolution- 
ary movement  is  quelled  but  that  the  revolutionary  parties, 
many  of  them  formed  or  crystallised  in  the  Duma,  have  been 
robbed  of  their  importance.  None  of  the  popular  parties  had 
any  hope  that  the  Czar  would  allow  the  Duma  to  accomplish 
anything,  and  they  finally  succeeded  in  their  great  common 
object,  which  was  to  teach  the  people  that  nothing  would  be 
gained  from  the  Government  that  was  not  taken  by  superior 
power. 

Three  years  of  revolution  and  three  national  assemblies  have 
brought  the  Russian  people  neither  freedom  nor  the  control  of 
their  Government,  nor  any  great  improvement.  If  the  revolu- 
tion should  now  draw  to  a  conclusion  all  the  colossal  struggle 
and  waste  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  lives  would  have  been 
for  nothing;  but  if  it  should  continue,  even  though  it  takes  a 
generation  to  overthrow  the  Czarism  and  establish  the  sover- 
eignty of  the  people,  all  the  sacrifice  will  be  justified.  Russia  is 
willing  to  pay  high  for  freedom  because  of  the  infamy  of  the 
Czarism,  because  of  the  qualities  of  her  peasant  population  and 
the  splendidly  progressive  character  of  the  people  of  her  towns. 
But  above  all  she  is  making  these  unheard  of  sacrifices  because 
of  the  greatness  that  lies  before  her.  A  people  that  will  have 
overcome  an  enemy  like  the  Czarism  backed  by  the  world's 


i8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

money  power,  will  not  shrink  before  the  greatest  social  regen- 
eration the  worid  has  ever  known. 

The  recent  partial  successes  and  complete  defeats,  the  mon- 
strosity of  the  evils  she  is  fighting,  the  difficulties  to  be  overcome, 
are  only  measures  of  the  power  the  nation  is  developing  in  the 
struggle  and  the  profundity  of  the  social  revolution  that  only 
such  a  struggle  can  call  into  being.  The  recent  dramatic 
struggle,  the  incredible  degradation  of  the  present  Government, 
the  tragic  spirit  of  rebellion  among  the  peasants,  the  exceptional 
intelligence  and  public  spirit  of  the  educated  classes,  the  daring 
and  devotion  of  the  revolutionists,  has  led  the  Russian  nation 
to  the  most  heroic,  the  most  inspired,  and  the  most  revolutionary 
social  movement  of  centuries. 

Because  of  this  revolutionary  social  movement  the  Russian 
people  lead  the  world  at  the  present  moment  in  the  imselfish 
devotion  of  individual  to  the  general  welfare,  in  the  systematic 
study  of  social  problems,  in  the  intensity  of  their  interest  in 
other  coimtries  and  other  periods,  in  the  subtlety  and  profimdity 
of  their  analysis  of  the  political,  social,  and  moral  movements  of 
our  time,  and  in  the  elevation  of  the  individual  type  which  is  a 
necessary  result  of  such  a  vigorous  social  movement. 

When  the  coming  regeneration  of  life,  which  is  believed  in 
as  a  religious  faith  by  all  sincere  and  disinterested  Russians 
from  the  peasants  to  Tolstoi  and  the  most  moderate  of  liberals, 
is  finally  accomplished,  the  world  may  have  to  look  to  Russia 
not  only  as  it  does  now  for  individuals  with  the  most  developed 
social  character  but  for  the  community  that  will  have  evolved 
for  the  first  time  social  equality  and  a  truly  social  government. 
The  germs  of  this  future  society  are  already  visible,  the  truly 
social  individuals  are  already  here.  That  complete  and  glad 
devotion  to  social  causes  that  must  constitute  the  life  principle 
of  the  men  of  the  future  is  already  embodied  in  inntmierable 
individual  Russians  of  the  present  generation. 


PART  TWO 

Oppression 


r 


CHAPTER  I 

NICHOLAS,     CZAR 

Russian  People,  who  journey  sad  and  trembling, 
Serfs  at  St.  Petersburg,  or  at  hard  labour  in  the  mines, 
The  North  Pole  is  for  your  Master,  a  dungeon  vast  and  sombre ; 
Russia   and    Siberia,    O    Czar!     Tyrant!     Vampire! 
\  These  are  the  two  halves  of  your  dismal  Empire; 
One  is  Oppression,  the  other  Despair! 

— Victor  Hugo  {Les  Chatiments) 

NICHOLAS  II.,  though  bom  heir  to  the  vast  Empire  of  the 
Romanoffs  and  absolute  master  of  a  hundred  and  forty 
million  people,  was  a  most  ordinary  child.  But  he  was  not 
long  allowed  to  remain  normal  or  ordinary.  All  the  unlimited 
resources  and  powers  of  a  Czar's  educators  from  infancy  to  man- 
hood, were  used  to  convince  him  that  he  is  the  God-bom  superior 
to  every  man  in  his  Empire,  and  that  he  has  been  given  the 
'right  by  God  to  regulate  to  the  last  particular  the  lives  of  each 
one  of  his  one  hundred  and  forty  million  subjects.  Such  an 
education  can  lead  to  only  one  result  —  with  ordinary  children. 

"I  knew  a  promising  young  princess,"  a  well-known  old 
courtier  told  me,  "who  had  inborn  progressive  ideas.  She  was 
given  to  asking  most  interesting  questions.  Her  teacher  was  of 
course  changed,  and  when  I  saw  her  again,  a  few  years  later, 
I  did  not  know  her,  she  was  so  much  like  the  rest.  It  is  impos- 
sible that  anything  good  should  come  out  of  that  poisonous  and 
misanthropic  atmosphere  of  the  Court.  I  have  abandoned 
hope."  So  with  the  Czar.  He  is  a  product  of  his  environment.* 
Or,  better,  he  is  part  and  parcel  of  the  whole  of  the  old  system. 
For  now  that  he  is  on  the  throne,  he  is  daily  creating  his  environ- 
ment and  his  environment  is  daily  creating  him.  \  ..  -^ 

That  Nicholas  II.,  by  nature  an  ordinary,  normal  man,  should 
have  developed  into  a  perfect  and  willing  tool  of  reaction  and 
an  enemy  of  progress,  is  a  sign  that  the  day  for  expecting  liberty 
from  Czars  or  benevolent  despots  has  passed.     The  sustamers 

21 


22  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

n  of  autocracy  have  read  history  and  studied  revolutions  aright. 
They  are  now  taking  no  chances  with  their  despots.  To  prevent 
his  becoming  better  than  those  around  him,  Nicholas,  like  his 
uncles  and  cousins,  the  notoriously  dissolute  grand  dukes,  was 
scientifically  corrupted  in  his  youth.  He  was  allowed  several 
mistresses.  A  Jewish  girl  whom  he  is  said  to  have  really  loved 
was  torn  away  from  him  by  the  Court.  True  love  is  dangerous 
to  despotism,  above  all  love  for  a  member  of  a  persecuted  race. 
His  notorious  affair  with  the  ballet-dancer,  Kshesinkaya,  which 
lasted  to  the  very  day  of  his  marriage,  was  more  after  his  uncle's 
heart.  He  was  allowed  to  endow  this  woman  with  a  palace 
and  a  fortune  in  jewels  and  gold. 

/And  while  his  body  was  being  corrupted  by  fast  living  and 
drink,  his  soul  was  imder  the  sinister  and  misanthropic  influence 
of  fanatic  old  Pobiedonostzev,  or  the  half -crazy  mysticism  of 
Father  John  of  Cronstadt,  who,  while  still  preaching  massacre, 
has  now  set  himself  up  for  a  Russian  Christ.  It  is  natural  that 
a  mind  so  beclouded  should  shower  honours  on  the  necromancer 
Phillipe,  and,  as  God-appointed  head  of  the  Russian  Church, 
canonise  the  monk  Seraphin,  dead  now  for  fifty  years,  for  having 
interceded  with  God  to  send  him  a  male  heir. 

Nicholas  is  by  education  an  ordinary  absolute  monarch,  as  h^^^ 
is  by  nature  an  ordinary  man.  If  he  has  lightly  glorified  war, 
so  has  William  II.  If  he  has  publicly  announced  his  hatred  of 
millions  of  his  subjects,  has  not  the  German  Emperor  called 
a  party  of  three  million  of  his  subjects  "dogs"?  He  differs 
from  other  autocrats  not  in  his  ideas  or  in  his  nature,  but  in 
his  actual  crimes.  UnfortuLnately  for  Nicholas,  history  offered 
him  the  choice  either  to  rise  above  the  monarch  to  the  true  man, 
or  else  to  sink  from  the  level  of  inhuman  feeling  and  opinion  to 
the  definite  degradation  of  criminal  acts.  Nicholas  chose  as  a 
Czar,  and  not  as  a  man.  As  a  consequence  the  Czarism 
has  been  preserved,  but  at  this  price,  that  the  Czar  has 
become  an  accessory  before  the  fact  to  a  policy  as  black  as 
anything  ever  dreamed  by  Machiavelli,  and  to  crimes  more 
horrible  than  any  that  have  been  perpetrated  in  Europe 
since  the  religious  wars. 

It  is  said  that  Nicholas  II.  is  not  to  be  known  or  judged  like 
ordinary  mortals,  that  he  is  helpless  against  the  grand  dukes, 


p< 


f^    2 
o    £ 

^  o 


a. 


NICHOLAS,    CZAR  23 

his  family,  and  the  court.  But,  as  was  pointed  out  to  me  by 
one  of  the  most  honoured  and  best-informed  men  in  Russia,  the 
Czar  has  long  selected  his  own  court  and  chosen  his  own  family 
favourites.  "An  autocrat  can  be  formed  by  his  environment  for 
a  few  years,"  said  this  man,  "but  since  the  age  of  thirteen  Nich- 
olas has  himself  created  his  own  environment."  Nicholas  loved 
the  old  reactionary  advisers  left  him  by  his  father  —  his  Uncle 
Sergius,  Minister  Sipiaguine,  and  Count  Ignatiev.  The  revolu- 
tionists have  taken  these  terrible  persons  away.  He  feared 
Von  Plehve,  who,  before  the  Czar  had  yet  obtained  a  secure  con- 
trol of  the  reins  of  government,  had  got  a  firm  hold  on  the  secret 
police,  a  position  impregnable  in  a  despotism.  The  revolution- 
ists also  solved  this  problem  for  him.  But  he  has  replaced 
the  reactionaries  he  loved  by  new  reactionaries. 

He  became  jealous  within  a  few  weeks  of  the  popularity  of  a 
successful  liberal  minister  like  Sviatopolk-Mirski.  Witte  he 
always  hated,  but  held  to  him  long  because  he  better  than  all 
others  could  procure  gold  in  biUions  from  Germany  and  France, 
His  present  favourites  are  all  either  discreet  reactionaries,  men 
of  blood  and  iron  like  Stolypine,  or  shameless  reactionaries 
like  Kaulbars.  Noble  leaders  of  the  black  league  formed  for 
massacres,  Bobrinsky,  Sherebatov,  Apraxin,  Konovnitzin, 
General  Bogdanovitch,  have  constant  access  to  the  court. 
Men  of  relentless  violence,  like  Prime  Minister  Stolypine, 
Deduline,  and  Dumovo,  are  given  the  ministries  that  hold  the 
real  power.  Kaulbars,  Skalon,  Herschelman,  and  Meller- 
Zakomelski  are  entrusted  with  the  fate  respectively  of  Odessa, 
Poland,  Moscow,  and  the  Baltic  provinces.  They  are  all  cynical, 
violent,  and  open  reactionaries.  It  was  Herschelman  who  upset 
even  the  military  law  of  the  realm  by  reversing  the  sentence 
of  a  military  court,  which  had  let  off  with  a  light  punishment 
four  drunken  peasants  who  had  insulted  a  policeman.  Herschel- 
man had  them  hanged.  When  new  laws  are  being  prepared  it  is 
the  reactionary  jurists,  old  Goremykin,  Stichinsky ,  and  Dumovo, 
not  real  experts,  who  are  taken  into  the  Czar's  personal  confi- 
dence. But  above  all,  to  swing  the  destiny  of  the  tortured  and 
suffering  peoples  and  nations  called  Russia,  one  must  win  the 
favour  of  the  Czar's  boon  companions,  the  extreme  reactionaries 
Prince    Orlov    and    the    Queen's    Secretary,    Prince    Putiatin. 


24  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Prince  Orlov  is  the  Czar's  drinking  companion,  Prince  Putiatin 
is  endeared  to  him  as  a  heritage  from  his  late  beloved  Uncle 
Sergius. 

Talents  for  despotism,  flattery,  and  intrigue,  these  are  all 
of  value  in  securing  a  commanding  position  and  power  in  the 
land  of  the  Czar.  "  But  the  only  way  to  succeed  permanently," 
said  one  of  the  most  trusted  and  best-known  of  my  informants, 
"the  only  certain  road  is  reactionism  —  open,  active,  and  bitter 
hatred  of  progress.  Nicholas  sometimes  tolerates  a  progressive 
person  for  a  short  time.  But  he  is  never  really  pleased  with 
anything  but  reaction,  movement  backward  toward  his  father's 
regime.  All  his  sympathies  are  for  reactionary  things,  all  his 
feelings  are  for  reactionary  men.  This  is  why  we  are  governed 
by  reactionaries,  why  Russia  may  have  to  go  through  far  worse 
trials  and  horrors  in  the  next  few  years  than  in  those  just  passed. 
The  Czar  is  oppressed  and  weighed  down  by  superior  intelligence, 
because  it  dwarfs  his  own  ordinary  powers.  He  can't  bear  it 
aroimd  him.  His  real  favourites  have  always  been,  and  doubt- 
less always  will  be,  dull  and  stupid  men."  Other  opinions 
equally  to  be  respected  are  in  entire  accord  with  this. 

"The  keynote  to  the  Czar's  character,"  said  another  authori- 
ty, "is  an  inflated  hypertrophied  self-love,  as  is  natural  and 
almost  inevitable  with  an  irresponsible  and  absolute  monarch. 
This  self-love  was  consciously  created  in  his  youth  and  is  pur- 
posely developed  by  all  who  approach  the  throne.  It  is  the 
explanation  of  every  important  act  of  the  reign.  For  instance, 
it  was  nothing  but  the  Czar's  self-love  that  brought  us  the  Duma 
and  a  few  months  later  took  this  Duma  away." 

At  enmity  with  the  people,  surrounded  by  dull  and  brutal 
persons  of  his  own  choosing,  endowed  himself  with  a  clearly 
expressed  love  for  violence  and  the  "good  old  times"  of  his 
father  Alexander  III.,  what  is  the  use  of  seeking  further  Nicho- 
las's political  ideas?  They  are,  of  course,  most  rudimentary. 
His  leading  idea,  expressed  in  every  public  utterance,  is  that 
his  personal  desires  and  the  welfare  of  his  immense  empire 
are  one  and  the  same  thing  — that  the  preservation  of  his  own 
unlimited,  irresponsible,  and  absolute  personal  rule,  and'  the 
maintenance  of  the  riches  and  irresponsible  power  of  his 
family  and  his  friends,  of  the  grand  dukes,  the  high  officials, 


NICHOLAS,    CZAR  25 

the  high  clergy,  the  high  nobihty  and  the  court,  are  all  entirely 
consistent  with  the  welfare  of  the  vast  and  varied  peoples  of 
the  realm. 

It  was  to  the  supposed  interest  of  the  grand  dukes,  the  Czar's 
mother,  the  Russian  police,  the  heads  of  the  army  and  the  court, 
to  declare  war  against  Japan.  The  nation,  almost  wholly 
opposed  to  the  calamitous  and  terrible  enterprise,  was  not 
consulted.  But  the  Czar,  justly  certain  that  he  was  acting  in 
accordance  with  the  wishes  of  his  family,  his  friends,  and  every- 
body he  respected,  entered  into  the  bloody  and  unprincipled 
business  with  a  light  heart.  He  said,  writes  Prince  Urussov, 
that  he  considered  the  Japanese  attack  "like  the  bite  of  a  flea" 
and  that  he  was  "fully  satisfied  with  the  progress  of  the  war" 
because  it  would  call  out  an  increase  of  the  patriotic  spirit, 
because  the  agitation  against  the  Government  would  cease  and  it 
would  he  easier  to  maintain  order  in  the  State.  This  unjust, 
bloody,  unpopular  war  was  brought  on,  then,  by  the  common 
human  frailties  of  a  single  individual  —  the  desire  to  please  his 
friends  and  relatives  and  the  determination  to  maintain  his 
control  of  his  inherited  property,  Russia,  at  any  cost. 

Nicholas  happens  to  be  absolute  master  of  the  lives  and 
property  of  one  hundred  and  forty  million  people,  and  that  they 
are  "the  submissive  servants"  of  his  will  is  agreed  by  all  defen- 
ders of  the  autocratic  system.  Imagine  the  wrath  of  such  a 
master  when  the  slaves  are  in  revolt.  Rebellious  slaves  have 
never  been  treated  as  human  beings,  and  their  revolts  have 
usually  been  put  down  without  stint  of  the  utmost  cruelties. 
In  Russia,  where  not  even  the  highest  of  the  nobility  have  any 
rights  against  the  Czar,  a  revolution  is  quite  incomprehensible 
to  the  supreme  power. 

A  certain  Russian  prince,  internationally  famed  for  honesty, 
moderation  and  public  spirit,  complained  in  person  to  the  Czar 
about  the  frightful  Bielostock  massacre.  After  having  shown 
that  the  massacre  was  carried  out  almost  entirely  by  the  soldiers 
and  police,  the  prince  said,  "This  thing  simply  cannot  continue. 
It  is  wrong." 

The  Czar  hesitated  long,  but  finally  answered:  "Yes,  it  is 
wrong.  It  is  wrong.  But  what  can  you  do?  These  people 
are  republicans  and   revolutionists." 


26  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  loyal  prince  excused  himself  in  hopeless  despair.  "The 
people  of  Bielostock  are  republicans  and  revolutionists;  that 
justifies  any  crime  against  them,"  thinks  the  Czar.  But  nine- 
tenths  of  the  Russian  people  are,  broadly  speaking,  revolution- 
ists. The  Czar  is  then  simply  at  war  with  his  own  people  — 
imhampered  by  any  usage  or  principle  of  civilised  humanity 
or  of  civilised  war. 

"What  is  the  exact  relation  of  the  Czar  to  the  crimes  and 
horrors  that  are  perpetrated  in  his  name?  Is  the  Czar  himself 
primarily  responsible,  or  are  others  more  to  blame?"  I  asked 
these  questions  of  the  men  in  Russia  best  able  to  answer,  and 
had  for  my  literal  replies:  "The  court  is  the  centre  of  the 
'pogromists'  and  'Black  Hundreds.*  The  Czar  himself  is  the 
chief  of  the  'hooligans.'"  And  I  foimd  such  to  be  the  almost 
unanimous  opinion  of  Russia's  most  reliable  men. 

Prince  Urussov,  recently  governor  of  Bessarabia,  places  a 
full  share  of  the  responsibility  for  the  wholesale  massacres  of 
1905  directly  on  the  Czar.  "A  word  from  the  authoritative 
mouth  of  the  Emperor  or  any  action  would  have  extraordinarily 
facilitated  the  maintenance  of  order,"  he  writes  significantly. 
But  every  effort  failed  to  obtain  from  Nicholas  either  any 
kind  of  declaration  condemning  the  pogroms,  or  even  the 
suggested  manifestation  of  unspoken  sympathy  with  the 
victims  through  some  slight  monetary  present  for  their  relief. 
"  From  1 903  "  writes  the  prince,  "it  became  plain  to  all  the  world 
that  the  Czar  himself,  if  not  in  action,  at  least  in  thought  and 
feeling,  was  an  enemy  to  the  Jews." 

A  recognised  enemy  to  the  Jews,  yes,  but  none  the  less  an 
enemy  to  the  Poles,  Armenians,  Finns,  Letts,  and  Lithuanians, 
as  the  most  credited  representatives  of  all  these  races  have 
testified,  and  to  all  the  fifty  million  non-Russian  peoples  that 
constitute  a  full  third  of  his  subjects.  For  the  actions  and 
policies  that  have  shown  the  Czar's  attitude  to  the  Jews,  the 
most  powerful  of  the  "subject"  peoples,  have  been  repeated, 
almost  exactly,  toward  the  rest.  A  recognised  enemy  also  of 
the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  common  people  of  Russian 
stock,  the  hundred  million  peasants  and  workingmen,  as  their 
representatives  in  the  Duma  testified.  Friend  only  of  the 
officials,  the  landlords,  the  very  rich,  the  few  himdred  thousand 


NICHOLAS,   CZAR  27 

pampered  Cossacks,  spies,  and  police,  who  altogether  constitute 
the  only  real  foundation  of  the  throne.  Friend,  also,  of  the 
murderers  who  have  carried  out  the  massacres  that  have  drenched 
the  land  in  blood.  Nicholas  is  no  mere  onlooker.  To  be 
sure  he  has  not  taken  part  in  the  shooting,  as  did  Charles  IX. 
in  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew,  but  he  is  literally  throwing 
open  the  prison  doors  for  all  who  have  murdered  "in  his  name." 
The  pogromists  at  Kertch,  at  Volsk,  at  Nijni  Novgorod,  in 
Volhynia,  in  Bessarabia,  at  Tula,  and  a  dozen  other  places, 
though  sentenced  by  the  local  courts,  have  all  been  fully  par- 
doned by  the  Czar.  The  Czar's  pardon  for  three  Kharkov 
assassins  who  murdered  a  lawyer  in  his  home,  carried  with  it  an 
even  more  open  excitation  to  a  repetition  of  the  act  in  the  words, 
"A  pardon  is  extended  to  X,  Y,  and  Z,  the  men  who  killed  the 
miscreant  revolutionary   Jew.'' 

One  of  the  chief  organisers  of  the  great  Odessa  massacre  of 
October,  1905,  when  nearly  a  thousand  were  killed  and  wounded, 
was  at  last  got  behind  the  bars.  The  circuit  court  could  not 
declare  him  innocent.  It  sentenced  him,  however,  to  only 
eight  months'  imprisonment.  He  soon  received  the  full  pardon 
of  the  Czar.  Numerous  other  pardons  followed,  until  the  daily 
massacres  in  that  city  increased  to  the  point  that  brought  a 
diplomatic  disgrace  to  the  Russian  Government.  The  combined 
foreign  consuls  felt  impelled  to  raise  a  protest;  it,  however, 
accomplished  nothing.  Nearly  every  day  shows  one  or  more 
open  and  cold-blooded  murders  to  be  attributed  directly  to 
the  immistakable  approval  of  the  Czar.  The  chief  of  police, 
Novitzki,  was  finally  forced  to  telegraph  Stolypine:  "It  is  not 
possible  for  the  police  to  fight  successfully  against  secret  leagues 
which  are  led  by  persons  who  guarantee  the  members  impunity  for 
crifne.** 

In  Odessa  the  Government  and  the  murderous  League  of 
Russian  Men  have  become  practically  one.  The  local  president 
of  the  league,  Count  Konovnitzin,  is  the  aid-de-camp  of  the 
governor-general,  Kaulbars;  the  latter  is  a  member  of  the 
executive  council  and  its  meetings  are  often  held  in  his  palace. 
Nicholas  himself  is  an  honorary  member  of  the  League.  A 
delegation,  headed  by  the  mayor,  recently  sent  by  desperate 
Odessa  to  the  court  to  complain  against  the  league's  atrocities 


28  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

was  received  by  the  Czar  wearing  on  his  breast  the  emblem  of 
the  League  of  Russian  Men.  That  emblem  was  significant  of 
his  answer:  he  has  delivered  the  great  port  of  Odessa,  with  its 
half  million  of  inhabitants,  to  the  tender  mercies  of  the  League. 

To  the  delegation  which  presented  him  his  badge  (and  one 
for  his  little  heir),  together  with  an  address  setting  forth  the 
"loyal"  and  anti-semi  tic  purposes  of  the  organisation,  Nicholas 
answered:  "Thank  in  my  name  all  the  Russian  people  who 
have  joined  the  league."  Stolypine  reported  recently  to  the 
Czar  that  60  per  cent,  of  this  notorious  league  was  recruited 
from  the  criminal  classes  and  scarcely  i  J  per  cent,  were  edu- 
cated persons.  On  Stolypine 's  report  Nicholas  wrote:  "The 
league  is  the  most  loyal  of  all  the  parties  and  the  most  useful 
to  the  Government.  It  would  be  well  to  be  patient  and  to  give 
it  time  to  improve  and  correct  itself." 

Dr.  Dubrowin,  president  of  the  league  and  editor  of  its  St. 
Petersburg  organ,  the  Russian  Flag,  was  asked  recently 
the  practical  way  out  of  Russia's  difficulties.  The  justly 
notorious  doctor  replied:  "It  is  necessary  to  hang  eleven  fore- 
most leaders  whom  I  cotdd  name,  two  hundred  secondary 
leaders  and  three  thousand  party  workers."  To  the  question 
as  to  who  could  be  foimd  to  execute  such  a  cruel  sentence,  he 
answered:  "The  League  of  Russian  Men  would  have  the  courage 
to  do  it."  Dubrowin  has  made  it  clear  that  he  reckons  among 
those  to  be  killed  not  only  beloved  popular  leaders  like  Anikine 
and  Aladdin,  but  also  moderates  like  the  economist  Herzenstein, 
already  assassinated  by  the  league,  if  not  by  Dubrowin 's  own 
personal  order.  No  Russian  revolutionist  has  ever  made  a 
proposal  of  wholesale  butchery  —  their  victims  are  the  victims 
of  a  guerilla  war.  It  is  not  the  revolution  for  freedom  that  has 
produced  the  Russian  Marat.  It  is  the  criminal  counter- 
revolution personally  patronised  by  the  Czar. 

At  first  it  was  proposed  to  make  Nicholas  himself  one  of  the 
three  members  of  the  league's  executive  board.  Later  the 
position  was  given  to  the  Czar's  new  favourite  and  spiritual 
adviser,  the  priest  Vostorgov.  This  "orthodox  Christian"  fire- 
eater  stirred  up  race-wars  in  the  Caucasus  imtil  he  was  forced 
to  flee  from  the  enraged  people.  Though  only  a  common  priest, 
he  has  now  taken  the  place  of  sinister  old  Pobiedonostzev  as  the 


NICHOLAS.   CZAR 


39 


theorist  of  arbitrary  autocracy  and  reaction  and  the  spiritual 
consoler  of  the  court  —  while  at  the  same  time  he  guides  the 
league  for  massacre.  The  Czar  in  appreciation  has  heaped 
exceptional  ecclesiastical  honours  on  his  head  and  has  given  him 
a  place  in  the  Holy  Synod.  With  the  coming  of  Vostorgov  it 
can  at  last  be  said  that  the  League's  end,  the  fusion  of  the 
"true  Russian  people"  with  the  "Most  High,"  has  at  last  been 
accomplished. 

The  title  "Most  High"  sounds  almost  blasphemous.  But 
in  the  eyes  of  the  advocates  of  absolutism  the  Czar  can  be 
guilty  of  no  blasphemy,  just  as  he  can  be  guilty  of  no  crime. 
What  he  does  is  not  only  right,  but  sacred.  The  heads  of  the 
Church  are  his  servants,  as  much  subject  to  his  orders  as  any 
peasants.  The  Czar  has  been  given  by  God  the  care  also  of  his 
subjects'  souls.  Every  important  ukase,  even  if  on  a  purely 
political  subject,  is  read  from  every  village  pulpit  along  with 
the  rest  of  "God's  word,"  likewise  emanating  from  the  whims 
and  dictation  of  Nicholas  and  other  Czars.  Every  expression 
and  activity  of  life,  every  book,  every  newspaper,  every  school, 
every  church  or  private  society,  must  be  forced  and  distorted 
to  express  absolute  obedience,  submission,  subjection,  and 
servility  to  the  Czar. 

If  a  man  in  whom  such  a  megalomania  is  cultivated  from 
early  childhood  is  not  engaged  personally  in  hunting  down  his 
subjects  like  Charles  IX.,  it  must  be  attributed  to  court  custom 
rather  than  to  anything  in  the  conscience  of  the  Czar.  Young 
German  barons  around  him  who  have  led  man-hunts  against 
peasants  they  have  harried  into  rebellion,  receive  his  full  sympa- 
thy, approval, and  even  promotion  for  their  actions;  while  those 
who  do  not  take  a  lively  interest  in  such  work  are  quickly  marked 
with  imperial  disfavour  and  disgrace.  This  bloody  business 
has  gone  so  far  that  many  who  in  the  past  have  been  reactionary 
or  circumspect  enough  to  rise  to  the  highest  rank,  are  now 
drawing  back  in  horror  and  disgust.  Not  so  the  Czar,  and  no 
titles  such  a  renegrade  may  bear,  no  services  rendered,  can 
save  him  from  the  imperial  wrath. 

To  an  officer  reporting  a  rather  bloodless  "pacification"  in 
the  west,  the  Czar  replied  after  a  long  meditative  silence: 
"Just  the  same,  you  have  killed  too  few,  you  have  killed  too 


30  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

few.'*  To  General  Kazbek,  reporting  a  similarly  bloodless 
success  against  the  revolutionists,  the  Czar  listened  without  a 
word.  After  having  given  his  report,  the  general  was  leaving 
and  was  already  near  the  door  when  he  heard  a  low,  harsh 
voice  behind  him.  He  turned  immediately  round;  the  Czar 
was  following  him  with  a  wolfish  stride,  and  hissing  through 
his  closed  teeth:  "You  ought  to  have  fired  just  the  same,  general! 
You  ought  to  have  fired  just  the  same! " 

The  famous  General  Subbotich,  a  member  of  the  general  staff 
and  recent  governor-general  of  Turkestan,  not  only  did  not 
shed  any  blood  in  his  province  but  scandalised  the  court  by 
making  several  speeches  in  which  he  promised  that  the  Czar 
would  carry  out  his  promises  expressed  in  the  October  Manifesto 
and  soon  begin  the  work  of  reform.  He  was  removed  from  his 
office  and  robbed  of  his  dignities  and  pension  without  any 
statement  of  the  cause.  He  demanded  a  trial  by  courts-martial, 
and  was  refused.  He  was  told  only  that  he  had  not  taken 
measures  to  suppress  the  revolution,  and  that  the  Emperor 
"had  deigned  to  refuse  to  let  him  know  the  tenor  of  the  accusa- 
tions against  him."  He  annotmced  himself  as  a  candidate  to 
the  Duma  from  the  most  conservative  class  of  St.  Petersburg, 
consisting  of  2,000  members  carefully  selected  by  the  Govern- 
ment, and  received  more  than  eight  himdred  of  their  votes. 
This  vote  is  an  evidence  of  the  fact  that  the  bitterness  of  all 
classes  has  reached  such  a  point  that  only  a  bare  half  even  of 
the  most  favoured  and  privileged  can  be  persuaded  to  stand  for 
the  bloodthirstiness  of  the  Czar. 

The  Czar  has  also  his  minor  heroes  of  violence.  A  certain 
cadet  heard  disrespectful  words  about  his  sacred  Majesty  on  the 
street.  He  struck  the  speaker  two  blows  on  his  head  with  his 
bayonet  and  the  latter  sank  to  the  groimd.  The  Czar  wrote 
with  his  own  hand  on  the  war  minister's  report  to  express  his 
thanks  for  this  "praiseworthy  action "  as  he  called  it.  A  certain 
cavalry  officer,  a  passenger  on  a  local  steamer,  called  the  members 
of  the  Dtuna  "rascals,"  entered  into  a  quarrel  with  his  fellow- 
passengers  and  finally  opened  fire  with  his  revolver,  seriously 
wounding  a  waiter  before  he  was  disarmed.  His  term  was 
shortened  by  his  Majesty's  favour  to  three  months'  police  arrest. 
A  soldier  shot  a  girl  prisoner  dead  through  the  head  for  looking 


^^':: 


NICHOLAS,   CZAR  31 

out  of  the  prison  window  against  the  rules.  He  was  sent  a 
present  of  five  dollars  by  the  Czar.  Since  then  this  act  has  been 
repeated  by  the  wholesale  in  all  parts  of  the  country. 

Nicholas  II.  is  a  criminal  in  the  eyes  of  his  people.  In  all 
sections,  among  all  classes,  among  rich  and  poor,  townspeople 
and  country  people,  the  educated,  the  business  men,  and  priests, 
there  is  one  dominating  opinion  about  the  Czar  —  that  he  bears 
to  the  full  his  share  of  the  responsibility  for  the  monstrous  system 
of  crime  and  plunder  called  the  Russian  Government,  that  he 
is  neither  better  nor  worse  than  the  average  of  his  predecessors, 
and  that  nothing  better  is  to  be  expected  from  his  successors 
since  even  the  Czars  themselves  are  products  of  the  Czarism 
it  is  sought  to  destroy.  The  people  have  no  desire  to  wait  tmtil 
the  Czarism  produces  a  ruler  who  is  not  a  Czar. 


'^^-^^ 


CHAPTER  II 

HOW  CZARS  GOVERN 

IT  IS  not  permissible  to  dip  far  into  Russian  history  in  the 
course  of  this  review  of  present-day  conditions.  But 
we  can  thoroughly  grasp  the  deep-seated  and  almost  unconscious 
feeling  of  Russia  about  her  rulers,  only  when  we  recall  what 
kind  of  Czars  the  Czarism  has  actually  produced.  The  first 
great  Czar  was  Ivan  the  Terrible.  He  was  a  successful  Czar 
and  did  Russia  the  inestimable  service  of  driving  out  the  Tar- 
tars and  more  than  doubling  the  extent  of  the  realm.  But 
when  he  was  not  crushing  the  Tartars  he  was  literally  crushing 
the  souls  and  bodies  of  his  own  people.  He  was  trained  purposely 
in  his  childhood  to  make  what  was  then  considered  the  strongest 
type  of  Czar,  a  man  whose  very  name  was  to  cause  fear  and 
submission  among  his  subjects  —  and  this  principle  of  govern- 
ment not  alone  by  the  strong  arm,  but  by  fear  of  it,  by  "terror," 
remains  a  leading  principle  of  the  Czar's  Government  to-day. 
We  have  seen  that  Nicholas  still  demands  bloodshed  instead  of 
unconditional  surrender,  and  we  shall  see  that  this  principle 
is  not  merely  one  of  the  chief  policies  of  State  but  the  very 
basis  of  the  whole  governmental  system. 

Ivan  set  an  example  of  Czarism  that  has  never  since  been 
equalled  —  though,  to  be  sure,  most  of  his  actions  have  been 
repeated  frequently  since  his  time.  When  as  late  as  the  middle 
of  the  sixteenth  century  Ivan  wiped  the  half-free  and  the  half- 
democratic  towns  of  Pskov  and  Novgorod  off  the  map,  he  did 
not  ask  for  surrender,  but  practised  deliberate  and  continuous 
tortures  for  the  space  of  five  weeks,  in  which  time,  one  chronicle 
says,  he  put  to  death  in  one  of  the  towns,  men,  women  and 
children  to  the  number  of  sixty  thousand.  Moscow,  in  1 5  70,  was 
treated  to  similar  tortures,  at  which  Ivan  as  usual  assisted 
in  person,  piercing  many  to  death  with  his  him  ting  spear. 
The  scene  was  on  the  great  sacred  place  in  Moscow,  afterward 

32 


HOW   CZARS   GOVERN  33 

christened  the  Red  Square,  in  front  of  the  famous  sacred 
church  erected  after  Ivan's  own  plans  and  clearly  announc- 
ing his  insanity,  but  which  has  served  ever  since  as  a  cherished 
model  for  the  Czars,  like  so  many  of  the  traditions  of  this 
age. 

Ivan's  practice  was  to  make  a  public  spectacle  of  his  "execu- 
tions," but  on  this  great  occasion  the  instruments  of  torture 
and  pots  for  boiling  people  alive  frightened  the  public  away, 
and  they  had  to  be  brought  back  by  main  force  to  witness  the 
performance.  Men  were  tortured  by  the  wholesale  in  all  ways 
known  to  human  ingenuity,  and,  what  is  rarer  in  modem  history, 
a  show  was  made  of  the  disgrace  and  tortures  of  women  and  girls, 
a  feature  entirely  in  accord  with  the  wild  and  cruel  private 
orgies  of  this  Czar.  After  torture  and  disgrace  the  women  and 
girls  were  killed  either  by  having  red-hot  spears  thrust  into 
their  bodies,  or  by  Ivan's  own  instrument.  Philip,  metro- 
politan of  Moscow  and  head  of  the  Church,  he  had  burned 
to  death  for  refusing  to  bless  him  after  his  debauchery  and 
crimes,  the  court  chancellor  was  cut  to  pieces,  the  treasurer 
boiled  alive,  and  a  certain  prince  lingered  impaled  on  stakes 
for  fifteen  hours  while  his  mother  was  shamed  by  the  soldiers 
before  his  eyes. 

Ivan's  cruelties  doubtless  somewhat  exceeded  what  might 
be  calculated  even  by  the  most  cold-blooded  despot  as  useful 
to  the  maintenance  of  his  power,  but  the  fact  remains  that  he 
was  successful  in  increasing  the  might  of  the  Czarism  both  at 
home  and  abroad,  and  his  example  has  not  been  without  its  influ- 
ence on  later  Czars.  To  Peter  the  Great  also,  who  ruled  more 
than  a  hundred  years  later,  human  life  was  nothing.  He  repeated 
almost  exactly  several  of  the  tortures  devised  by  Ivan,  as  well 
as  the  executions  "in  person."  He  also  caused  the  death  of 
his  own  son  Alexis.  Fortunately,  however,  Peter  the  Great 
was  a  man  of  ideas.  If  the  building  of  St.  Petersburg  cost  as 
many  unnecessary  lives  as  the  destruction  of  Novgorod,  there 
was  at  least  a  more  positive  result.  Peter  also  had  less  time  for 
cruelty  than  Ivan,  since  he  was  busied  with  what  he  considered, 
often  rightly,  to  be  real  affairs  of  State.  But  like  Ivan  he 
governed  by  execution,  torture  and  terror,  enjoyed  the  cruelty 
in  person,  and  indulged  in  as  bestial  and  wholesale  debauchery 


34  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

as  the  world  has  known.  In  one  respect  he  went  farther  than 
Ivan,  insisting  on  forcing  on  all  the  nation  every  detail  of  his 
arbitrary  and  sometimes  even  whimsical  "will."  By  regulating 
every  detail  of  his  subjects'  lives,  even  to  the  cut  of  their  beards, 
he  reduced  every  individual  of  the  nation  to  the  position  of  his 
personal  servant  or  serf. 

Catharine  II.  was  scarcely  less  debauched  than  Peter,  and 
scarcely  less  cruel  to  the  great  mass  of  her  subjects.  But, 
though  she  undoubtedly  caused  the  death  of  her  husband  and 
many  others  for  whom  she  felt  enmity,  she  showed  as  a  rule  a 
woman's  gentleness  to  those  immediately  about  her.  However, 
as  these  last  were  her  companions  in  luxury  and  debauch,  the 
nation  had  little  benefit  from  the  descent  of  the  great  Empress 
to  this  ordinary  virtue  of  the  human  race.  Her  successor,  Paul, 
reverted  to  the  arbitrariness  of  Peter.  It  would  be  more  inter- 
esting to  show  the  disastrous  effects  of  this  reversion  on  the 
people,  which  finally  led  to  his  assassination,  than  the  ridiculous 
forms  it  took  in  his  personal  behaviour.  But  it  is  personal 
character  tha|*  concerns  us  for  the  moment,  and  nothing 'reveals 
his  character  better  than  his  compelling  his  subjects  to  kneel, 
in  dust,  rain,  mud,  or  snow,  to  his  holy  person  when  his  carriage 
passed;  and  he  even  snatched  a  cap  from  an  infant's  head  when 
a  nurse  did  not  know  how  to  honour  his  presence. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  that  Alexander  I.  was  privy  to  the 
murder  of  his  father,  and  his  reign,  thus  begun  so  thoroughly 
in  the  tradition  of  the  Czars,  was  in  perfect  accord  with  his 
predecessors'.  Europe,  always  densely  ignorant  of  all  things 
Russian  and  most  hopelessly  in  the  dark  about  the  true  character 
of  the  Czars,  for  some  time  took  Alexander  I.  for  a  liberal,  as 
it  had  taken  Peter  and  Catharine,  and  has  since  taken  Alex- 
ander II.  and  the  present  Czar.  The  original  basis  for  this 
conception  was  slim;  later  the  conception  became  absurd,  for 
Alexander  formed  the  Holy  Alliance  to  battle  against  every  great 
idea  the  French  Revolution  had  introduced,  and  Russia  became 
the  mainstay  of  the  reaction  in  Europe  until  her  defeat,  fifty 
years  later,  in  the  Crimean  War  and  her  replacement  at  this  post 
of  honour  by  Prussia  and  the  German  Empire  of  to-day.  It 
was  Alexander  who  added  the  Prussian  military  discipline  and 
servitude  to  the  other  burdens  of  the  nation.     In  his  military 


HOW    CZARS   GOVERN 


35 


colonies  the  new  militarism  was  combined  with  serfdom,  till  it 
became  a  full  penal  system  of  forced  labour. 

Nicholas  I.  brought  the  new  military  serfdom  to  its  perfection, 
to  the  envy  of  Prussia  and  other  "military"  powers;  and  he 
went  even  further  and  applied  this  system  to  the  post-office 
and  other  public  service,  to  several  industries  and  to  the 
mines.  When  Nicholas's  army  crushed  the  liberties  of 
Hungary  in  1849,  his  generals,  Haynau  and  others,  were  so 
cruel  that  even  Turkey  refused  to  give  up  the  refugees,  and 
America  finally  felt  impelled  to  carry  Kossuth  away  on  a 
frigate  of  the  Government. 

Alexander  II.  again,  who  was  forced  to  emancipate  the  serfs  .  c^ 
by  the  failure  of  the  Crimean  War  and  the  impossibility  of  I  ^ 
creating  a  modem  army  or  raising  the  taxes  under  the  old  I  » 
regime,  was  known  as  a  liberal  in  Europe  until  his  barbarous  | 
suppression  of  the  Polish  insurrection.  It  was  only  because 
he  had  taken  away  the  very  slight  liberties  he  had  granted  that 
a  group  of  revolutionists  robbed  him  of  his  life.  This  revolu- 
tionary act  in  turn  stirred  the  reactionary  forces  in  the  Empire 
to  make  a  "martyr"  of  him,  and  gullible  Europe,  which  for 
years  had  turned  away  from  him  in  disgust,  again  took  up 
his  cause  and  still  does  honour  to  his  memory  as  a  "liberal" 
Czar.  Alexander  III.,  the  present  Czar's  father,  was  a  typical 
Czar,  without  any  special  talents,  blindly  devoted  to  reaction, 
absolutism,  and  the  narrowest  conception  of  the  Church,  sur- 
rounded by  dull  and  servile  flatterers  and  leading  the  narrowest 
personal  life,  absorbed  in  trivialities  and  drink.  It  was  this- 
stagnant,  suffocating  atmosphere  that  produced  the  "heroes"' 
of  the  present  reign  —  its  half-crazy  or  sinister  fanatic  priests ;; 
its  demoniacal  and  all-powerful  police  heads,  von  Plehve  and 
Trepov;  the  organisers  of  the  statesmanship  of  persecution 
of  subject  races,  Ignatiev  and  the  Grand  Duke  Sergius;  the 
first  theoretical  defenders  of  absolutism,  Absakov  and  Leontieff, 
who  sought  to  keep  out  of  the  policy  of  the  Russian  State  the 
new  and  "obnoxious  principle  of  seeking  the  material  and  moral 
welfare  of  the  human  race." 

Russia  has  learned  something  from  her  Czars.  She  has 
learned  that  it  is  one-man  power  itself  that  is  wrong.  Nearly 
all  thoughtful  Russians  feel  that  the  concentration  of  govern- 


36  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

mental  power  in  the  hands  of  a  single  man  is  the  worst  curse 
that  can  befall  a  people.  They  know  that  the  only  possible 
defence  of  such  a  system  is  based  on  a  lie,  a  radical  miscon- 
ception of  the  nature  of  the  human  individual  and  the  race. 
And  they  know  that  the  first  result  of  this  lie  is  to  distort, 
corrupt,  or  pervert  the  mind  and  character  of  the  ruler  himself, 
so  that  there  can  be  no  benevolent  despot  unless  by  chance,  and 
that  such  a  despot,  if  intelligent,  would  have  to  deny  despotism 
itself,  and,  if  honest,  put  it  to  an  end.  In  Russia  there  is  no 
Napoleonic  worship,  no  "great  man"  theory,  no  demand  for, 
and  no  blind  faith  in,  all-powerful  leaders.  There  is  too  much 
similarity,  as  far  as  the  masses  of  the  people  are  concerned, 
between  the  reigns  of  the  Czar-genius  Peter  and  the  lunatic 
Ivan  the  Terrible,  between  the  reactionary  "liberal"  Nicholas 
II.  and  the  conqueror  of  Napoleon  and  the  French  Revolution, 
Alexander  I. 

The  present  reyolutionary  movement  of  the  Russian  nation 
must  have  arisen  under  any  Emperor.  It  is  directed  against 
Czarism  rather  than  against  any  particular  Czar.  But  in  so 
far  as  the  Russian  ruler  is  really  Autocrat  and  Czar,  that  is, 
in  proportion  as  he  rules  by  his  own  will  and  not  that  of  the 
people,  he  is  the  living  embodiment  of  the  despotism.  The 
present  Czar,  all  future  Czars,  must  stand  or  fall  with  the 
system  of  which  they  are  a  part.  Since  Nicholas  II.  remains 
head,  or  at  least  centre,  of  the  old  system,  since  he  refuses 
to  abdicate  or  share  his  power,  and  since  he  is  neither  a 
degenerate  nor  a  weakling  under  duress,  he  must  bear  his  share 
of  the  great  crimes  of  the  system  of  which  he  is  a  part. 

This  is  the  judgment  of  the  Russian  people.  It  is  the  judg- 
ment of  their  leaders  and  noted  men:  of  writers  like  Tolstoi, 
Gorki,  Korolenko,  and  Andreief ;  of  public  men  of  international 
fame  like  Kovalevski,  Roditchev,  Prince  Dolgorukov  and 
Milyoukov;  of  conservative  leaders  like  Shipov,  Stachovitch, 
Count  Hey  den,  Prince  Trubetzkoi,  and  Prince  Lvov;  of  the 
liberal  parish  priesthood  and  its  leaders.  Father  Petrov  and  the 
Archimandrite  Michael ;  of  recent  governors  and  ministers  and 
generals  like  Urussov,  Kutler,  and  Subbotich — in  fact,  of  prac- 
tically every  public  man  of  the  first  rank  outside  of  the  Govern- 
ment service.     Not  only  the  masses  of  the  Russian  people,  then, 


HOW   CZARS   GOVERN  37 

but  its  best  brain  and  soul  are  in  revolt  against  both  Czarism 
and  against  Nicholas  II.,  because  he  is  Czar. 

This  slow-witted,  self-centred  reactionary  and  blood-loving 
tyrant  is  recognised  by  the  Russian  nation  as  its  most  deadly 
enemy,  not  because  he  is  stronger  or  more  vicious  than  many 
others  in  high  places  in  the  State,  but  because  he  is  on  account 
of  his  position  and  his  power  the  centre  of  the  system  that  it 
is  costing  the  country's  best  life-blood  to  destroy;  not  because 
he  is  any  worse  than  his  predecessors,  or  because  his  successors 
can  be  expected  to  turn  out  any  better  than  he,  but  just  because 
there  lives  in  him  and  breathes  in  all  his  actions  the  very  spirit 
of  ''the  Czar." 

But  if  Nicholas  is  no  better  than  the  machine  by  which  he 
"governs,"  certainly  the  machine  is  no  better  than  the  Czar. 
In  every -day  life  the  Czarism  exists  only  in  the  form  of  millions 
of  irresponsible  officials  directing  every  detail  of  life  even  to 
the  commonest  business  affairs  —  officials  who  get  their  direc- 
tions either  from  the  senseless,  confused,  and  lifeless  orders  of 
irresponsible  and  neglected  bureaus,  or  from  the  protdg^s  of 
the  court,  who  without  the  slightest  thought  given  to  their 
capacity  or  achievement  have  caught  the  eye  of  a  favourite, 
or  of  the  favourite  of  a  favourite,  of  the  Czar. 

The  court  is  the  first  and  most  indispensable  support  to  the 
throne.  Here  is  the  mother,  here  are  the  uncles,  the  father's 
advisers  and  all  the  sure  and  tried  supporters  of  the  former 
Czars  —  the  only  channel  in  a  Czarism  or  purely  personal  govern- 
ment through  which  the  ruler  can  get  even  a  slight  idea  of  his 
nation.  Nearly  all  the  members  of  the  court  are  of  course  also 
members  of  the  bureaucracy.  Some  to  be  sure  are  merely  rich 
idlers,  such  as  ornamented  the  court  in  France  before  the  revolu- 
tion. Others  hold  sinecures,  are  called  assistant  ministers  and 
appear  at  the  bureaus  a  few  times  in  a  week,  or  attend  the  occa- 
sional meetings  of  some  very  honourable  commission  without  any 
real  function  or  power.  Whether  they  are  suited  for  it  or  not, 
those  persons  nearest  the  Emperor  are  usually  given  positions  of 
exalted  power.  One  grand  duke  is  head  of  the  army,  another 
of  the  navy.  The  Russian  Supreme  Court,  called  the  Senate,  is 
filled  with  such  men  alone  as  happen  to  have  been  in  the  most 
intimate  relations  with  the  Czar,  his  father,  or  some  grand  duke. 


38  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  Czar  must  have  some  system  or  machine  by  which  he 
expresses  his  power,  and  carries  out  the  details  of  **  govern- 
ment."    This  system,  before  the  days  of  Peter  the  Great,  was 
a  sort  of  despotic  feudalism ;  since  that  time  it  has  been  a  bureau- 
cracy of  the  Prussian    type.     This    bureaucracy    had    to    be 
made  an  integral  part  of  Czarism,  and  this  was  accomplished 
not  alone  by  sending   the  court  into  the  bureaucracy,  but  by 
bureaucratising  the  court.     Now  the    court  and    bureaucracy 
are    inseparable.     The    court    represents    the    unlimited     and 
arbitrary  power  of  the  Czars  over  the  lives  and  property  of  the 
people,  the  bureaucracy  the  only  method  by  which  it  is  possible 
for  the  Czar  and  the  court  to  profit  from  this  power.     The  army, 
the  police,  all  governors  and  vice-czars,  all  those  who  have  the 
right  to  exercise  to  the  full  the  Czar's  arbitrary  power  —  that 
is  to  say,  all  the  human  tools  necessary  for  defending  by  force 
the  hated  bureaucracy  —  all  these  are  under  the  direct  control 
of  the   Czar,   subject  neither  to   Dumas  nor  to  bureaucratic 
ministries.     On  the  other  hand,  all  the  tax-gathering,  borrowing 
from  abroad,  all  the  banking,  railway,  and  other  business  for 
supporting  the  arbitrary  power  of  the  court  and  the  Czar, 
are  necessarily  systematised  under  the  Government  bureaus. 
I      Peter's  new  bureaucratic  machine  of  course  immensely    in- 
:■  creased  the  work  of  the  Government.     New  departments  arose 
one  after  another,    until  finally  the  biggest  businesses  like  rail- 
roads and  banking  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  State.     Some  of 
the  most  costly  departments,  the  political  courts,  prisons,  and 
police,   the  army  of  rural  guards,   the  censorship,   could  not 
prove   of   any   possible   service   in   an   intelligently    organised 
and    democratic    society.     With    industrial    development    new 
sources  of  taxation  were  discovered ;  sugar,  tobacco  and  petro- 
leum were  made  to  produce  immense  sums,  and  the  entire  profit 
of  the  liquor  industry  was  taken  over  in  the  form  of  a  monopoly 
by  the  State.     Such  of  these  profits  and  taxes  as  finally  reached 
the  central  treasury  were  again  the  source  of  innumerable  easily 
earned  incomes  in  the  "administration."     Modem  equipment, 
for  instance,  must  be  supplied  and  applied  in  the  army  and  a 
modem    fleet    created.     "Self-made"    bureaucrats    began    to 
accumulate  fortunes  in  plunder,  with  the  aid  of  which  they 
became  irresistible  in  the  most  aristocratic  society.     Soon  there 


HOW  CZARS   GOVERN  39 

were  more  rich  and  successful  bureaucrats  in  the  court  than 
there  were  pampered  courtiers  in  the  bureaucracy.  Now, 
indeed,  most  of  the  ministers  and  chiefs  of  departments  come 
from  the  former  class.  But  the  distinction  is  only  superficial 
In  the  long  run  the  successful  courtier  must  know  how  to  make 
his  way  by  means  of  the  bureaus,  must  understand  how  to 
"govern"  as  it  is  understood  by  the  loyal  supporters  of  the 
Czars ;  while  a  successful  bureaucrat  can  only  meet  a  miserable 
end  if  he  is  not  at  the  same  time  a  true  courtier,  a  believer 
in  the  reactionary  principles  of  Czarism  and  a  proved  expert  in 
the  practice  of  irresponsible  despotism. 

The  corruption  of  the  court  from  the  grand  dukes  down, 
the  inefficiency  of  the  bureaucracy,  are  proverbial.  But 
this  corruption  of  individuals  is  a  commonplace,  hardly  worse 
than  what  exists  in  many  other  countries.  If  the  Czar  should 
ever  succeed,  as  he  no  doubt  desires,  since  it  is  the  Czarism 
itself  which  is  being  despoiled,  in  developing  a  rigid  system 
of  inspection  and  control  of  Government  bureaus  irresponsible 
to  the  people,  there  would  still  remain  the  wholesale  legal 
robbery  and  oppression  that  arises  from  the  Czarism 's  mere 
existence. 

The  present  Russian  Government  is  a  product  of  historical 
evolution.  The  main  determining  factor  in  its  development 
from  the  beginning  has  been  not  the  welfare  of  Russia,  but  that  of 
each  privileged  class  in  exact  proportion  to  its  nearness  to  the 
throne.  Every  bureau  of  the  Government  is  based  on  this 
principle;  all  are  more  or  less  anti-social  in  the  very  founda- 
tion of  their  methods  and  organisation,  and  in  the  training  of 
their  personnel.  A  high  position  is  attained  only  through  the 
sacrifice  of  many  elementary  principles  of  personal  honesty 
and  of  reasonable,  not  to  say  legal,  administration.  It  is  held 
only  by  a  complete  abandonment  of  every  principle  for  that  of 
the  mere  preservation  of  the  power  of  the  Czar,  the  bureaucracy 
and  the  court,  the  maintenance  of  the  Czarism. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE    CZARISM    STRUGGLING    FOR   EXISTENCE 

FULLY  to  picture  the  Czarism  as  a  single  whole  and  realise 
its  life-principle,  one  must  see  it  at  the  moment  of  a 
death-struggle  to  preserve  its  existence.  Such  a  struggle 
began  with  the  present  revolutionary  movement  just  before  the 
war  with  Japan,  reached  its  culmination  with  the  Czar's  Mani- 
festo, and  has  by  no  means  entirely  subsided  at  the  present  time. 

The  negation  of  autocracy  is  constitutional  government. 
If  a  constitution  places  any  essential  part  of  the  Czar's  power 
finally  in  the  hands  of  the  people  or  of  a  given  social  class 
the  unlimited  "autocratic"  rule  of  the  Czar  has  disappeared, 
since  he  may  always  be  forced  to  terms  with  the  new  power. 
The  promises  of  the  Manifesto  were  so  broad  that  it  seemed  to 
many  that  the  beginning  of  a  constitution  had  been  granted 
and  that  the  autocracy  was  a  thing  of  the  past.  The  17th  of 
October,  1905  (October  30th  Western  calendar),  was  then 
an  intensely  critical  moment  in  the  history  of  the  autocracy, 
and  this  was  fully  realised  by  nearly  all  the  court,  bureaucracy, 
and  other  defenders  of  the  old  power.  In  the  desperate  battle 
for  its  existence  that  ensued,  not  only  the  organisation  of  the 
Czarism  and  its  policy,  but  its  very  soul  is  exposed. 

At  this  supreme  moment  the  Czarism  pulled  itself  together 
as  a  single  man,  called  to  the  aid  of  the  court  and  bureaucracy 
the  only  other  classes  from  which  support  can  be  safely  relied 
on,  the  land-owning  nobility  and  the  dregs  of  the  city  population, 
and  fell  back  on  the  traditional  policy  of  the  Czars  —  i.e., 
to  promote  civil  war  by  official  lying  and  the  machinery  of 
the  Government,  and  then  to  step  in  and  crush  the  divided 
forces  of  the  people.  For  this  purpose  any  line  of  cleavage 
will  do,  religion,  race,  or  social  class.  "Patriotism"  is  the 
general  term  employed  by  the  Government  to  rouse  and  justify 
all  such  conflicts.     Catholics,  Protestants,  Jews,  Mohammedans, 

40 


CZARISM   STRUGGLING  FOR   EXISTENCE         41 

and  Russian  dissenting  creeds  are  not  patriotic  because  they  do 
not  belong  to  the  Orthodox  Church.  Poles,  Jews,  Armenians, 
and  Germans,  though  they  speak  Russian  and  have  lived  in 
Russia  a  century  or  centuries,  are  foreigners.  College  gradu- 
ates, professional  men,  and  factory  workmen  had  no  part  in  old 
Russia  and  are  rarely  inclined  toward  the  Czar ;  they  are  suspected 
classes  in  the  official  propaganda  —  they,  too,  are  unpatriotic. 

But  patriotism.  Orthodoxy,  and  Czarism  are  not  sufficiently 
concrete  conceptions  to  bind  the  whole  of  the  reactionary  move- 
ment together.  There  was  need  of  a  common  enemy  —  an 
arch  enemy,  present  everywhere,  always  more  or  less  active. 
This  enemy  has  been  found  in  the  Jews.  For  notwithstanding 
the  confining  of  the  majority  of  the  Jews  in  one  section  of  the 
country,  the  Pale,  the  minority  is  scattered  everywhere  and  is 
everywhere  pressing  into  the  newest  occupations  and  movements, 
and  like  all  others  of  the  oppressed  nationalities  is  in  universal 
opposition  to  the  Czarism. 

The  whole  philosophy,  character,  morality,  and  programme  of 
the  autocracy  is  expressed,  then,  in  the  cry  "Down  with  the 
Jews."  When  in  the  height  of  its  prosperity  the  Czarism  has 
no  need  of  popularity,  it  announces  no  programme  and  no  philos- 
ophy. But  when  it  is  in  need  of  popular  aid,  of  loyal  support 
and  sacrifice  other  than  such  as  it  can  command  always  from 
the  nobility  bought  with  privileges,  or  from  the  dregs  bought 
with  drink,  it  has  resort  to  the  cry  "Down  with  the  Jews"; 
and  as  conditions  vary  it  adds,  "and  with  Poles,"  or  "and  with 
the  intellectuals,"  or  even  "with  the  workingmen."  This 
invariably  brings  together  the  reaction  as  a  man,  and  appealing, 
as  it  will  be  shown  later,  to  the  lowest  passions  of  the  non- 
reactionary  classes,  almost  invariably  draws  a  few  of  their 
weakest  and  most  depraved  members.  There  is  not  a  criminal 
or  degenerate  impulse  of  mankind  that  is  not  played  upon  to 
maintain  the  integrity  of  "Holy  Russia"  and  the  power  of  the 
"Most  High."  Personal  revenge,  lust,  crazy  fanaticism, 
incredible  superstition  and  ignorance,  depravity  in  drink, 
desire  for  social  position,  greed,  or  mere  envy  and  prejudice 
fanned  to  a  flame  of  murderous  hatred,  are  all  motives  to  which  a 
Czarism  struggling  for  existence  makes  its  daily  call. 

The  propaganda  begins  necessarily  with  the  secretly  spoken 


42  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

approval  of  the  Czar  himself,  but  it  is  also  openly  manifest  to 
all  in  the  numberless  laws  specially  directed  against  the  Jews. 
When  Prince  Urussov  was  sent  to  Kishinev  directly  after  the 
massacre  there,  in  response  to  the  world-wide  demand  for  a 
more  liberal  governor,  he  was  warned  by  the  Czar's  famous 
Minister  von  Plehve  to  show  "less  sentimental  friendship  for 
the  Jews."  In  a  long  talk  with  the  Czar  at  this  time  the  prince 
was  unable  to  get  from  him  any  expression  whatever  on  the 
Jewish  question  and  had  to  drop  all  reference  to  the  recent 
pogrom  on  account  of  the  manifest  displeasure  of  the  Czar. 
It  was  clearly  agreed  between  Nicholas  and  Plehve  that  the 
latter  was  to  handle  this  vital  matter.  But  there  was  no  reason 
then,  and  there  has  been  none  since,  to  suggest  any  discord  on 
this  subject  between  the  two.  The  attitude  of  all  high  officials 
and  those  most  likely  to  know  the  Czar's  will  was,  says  Prince 
Urussov,  **  either  to  remain  silent  or  to  justify  the  position 
towards  the  pogroms  reflected  in  the  Russian  anti-semi  tic  press, 
and  which  therefore  appeared  in  a  certain  sense  binding  on  all 
persons  in  public  service." 

The  impression  of  the  highest  officials  spread  down  through 
every  servant  of  the  Government  to  the  least  privileged  elements 
of  the  population.  "We  have  come  to  carry  out  the  Czar's  will 
that  we  should  massacre  the  Jews,"  said  a  crowd  of  peasants 
when  asked  by  an  official  at  the  time  of  the  massacre  why  they 
had  come  to  Kishinev.  This  interpretation  of  the  "Czar's  will " 
certainly  had  a  plausible  basis,  thinks  Prince  Urussov,  in  the 
numberless  legal  and  illegal  persecutions  of  the  Jews  by  the 
officials  and  their  denunciation  by  the  highest  persons  in  the  land. 
For  instance,  these  peasants  could  have  read  in  Krushevan's 
paper,  which  was  permitted  by  the  censor,  and  subsidised  by  the 
Government  both  before  and  after  the  pogrom,  the  following: 

Down  with  the  Jews!  Massacre  these  bloody  monsters  wallowing 
in  Russian  blood! 

Act  so  that  they  will  recall  the  Odessa  pogrom,  where  the  troops  them- 
selves helped  us.  This  time  they  will  help  too,  inspired  as  they  are  here 
by  the  love  of  Christ! 

Brothers,  lend  us  your  strong  arms! 

Massacre  these  vile  Jews! 

We  are  already  numerous. 

(Signed]     The  Party  op  Workingmen, 
Who  are  true  Christians. 


CZARISM   STRUGGLING   FOR   EXISTENCE         43 

As  a  reward  for  this  and  similar  work  Krushevan  was  afterward 
elected  to  the  Duma  with  the  aid  of  the  officials  and  the  Czar's 
Bessarabian  favourites,  Pureschevitch  and  the  Krupenskys. 
Indeed,  when  Governor  Urussov  complained  against  this  paper 
to  the  chief  of  the  newspaper  censorship,  Senator  Swerew,  a 
trusted  adviser  of  the  Czar,  he  had  for  answer  that  Krushevan 's 
tendencies  and  activities  had  a  sound  basis.  Did  not  the  peas- 
ants have  good  reason  for  assuming  that  the  massacre  was  the 
will  of  the  Czar? 

The  semi-official  massacres  that  accompanied  the  Czar's 
Manifesto  of  Liberty  were  not  a  chance  outburst  of  reactionary 
passion.  They  were  not  dictated  by  a  mere  desire  of  the  reac- 
tionaries for  revenge,  but  by  the  old  and  deep-laid  plot  to 
/  create  a  counter-revolution.  They  were  the  one  possible  solu- 
tion of  the  crisis  accepted  by  all  the  extreme  reactionaries 
of  the  Empire.  Furthermore,  they  did  not  spring  directly  out 
.of  the  Manifesto.  Soon  after  the  January  massacre  of  1905  in 
f  St.  Petersburg,  and  many  months  before  the  Manifesto,  public 
.  opinion  had  already  brought  Nicholas  to  promise  the  rather 
^  empty  form  of  an  elected  but  purely  consultative  national  council. 
To  counteract  the  danger  of  this  concession,  arrangements  had 
already  been  made  to  give  the  autocracy  a  new  basis  in  a  popu- 
lar counter-revolutionary  uprising,  or  wholesale  massacres  of 
v^intellectual  leaders,  Jews  and  organised  workingmen,  with  the, 
Caid  of  the  police,  the  Cossacks,  and  a  part  of  the  priests,  the 
•black  monks.  But  owing  to  the  unexpected  general  strike  and 
necessity  of  signing  of  the  Manifesto,  the  date  fixed  for  the 
massacres  had  to  be  set  forward.  The  Manifesto  granted,  the 
signal  for  the  postponed  murder  was  given. 

The  day  following  the  Manifesto,  at  a  hundred  different 
points  at  once,  the  wholesale  and  prearranged  massacres  of  men, 
women,  and  children  began.  Everyv.rhere  the  bloody  work  was 
carried  on  by  small  bands  of  ruffians  organised  and  led  by  the 
police  and  protected  by  the  troops. 

Urussov,  as  assistant  to  Witte,  unearthed  and  exposed  to 
the  Duma  and  the  whole  world  the  direct  responsibility  of  Trepov, 
Ratchkovsky,  the  head  of  the  police,  and  many  others  of  the 
Czar's  favourites,  in  these  massacres.  Conclusive  evidence  in 
incriminating  the  police  is  scarcely  lacking  in  one  of  the  hundred 


44  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

places  where  the  massacres  occurred.  Lopuchin,  the  chief  of 
the  police  department  at  the  time,  has  come  out  with  his  state- 
ment that  "Government  officials  have  systematically  prepared 
Jewish  and  other  massacres.  The  facts  were  given  to  Witte 
and  verified  by  another  official  .  .  .  and  one  proclamation 
was  approved  in  writing  by  Wuitch,  head  of  the  secret  police." 
The  prefect  of  Sebastopol  received  on  the  17  th  of  October, 
the  very  day  of  the  Manifesto,  a  telegram,  signed  Trepov,  enjoin- 
ing him  not  to  publish  the  Manifesto  before  receiving  money  for 
a  "patriotic  (reactionary)  demonstration."  A  few  days  later 
he  received  sixty  thousand  rubles  for  this  purpose  and  a  sug- 
gestion that  he  should  retire  the  police.  Similar  telegrams 
were  sent  in  all  directions  by  the  highest  officials  and  favourites. 
y  These  exposures  in  the  Duma  effected  absolutely  nothing. 
Trepov  remained  in  office  until  his  final  sickness.  The  chief 
of  the  police  is  still  in  daily  contact  with  the  Czar.  The  court 
favourites  are  still  the  court  favourites.  The  local  governors 
and  police  who  more  or  less  actively  took  part  in  the  massacres 
have  largely  been  promoted  and  rewarded  in  person  by  the 
Czar.  The  actual  murderers  Nicholas  is  now  letting  out  of 
jail  by  twos  and  threes  and  dozens,  as  a  direct  act  of  grace 
from  the  throne  at  a  time  when  on  grounds  of  public  policy 
pardons  are  refused  to  all  other  persons. 

At  the  time  of  the  opening  of  the  third  Duma  the  country 
was  quiet  enough  to  bring  some  of  the  massacres  and  many  of  the 
revolutionary  disturbances  before  the  courts.  It  is  significant 
to  compare  the  wholesale  sentences  of  revolutionists  with  the 
fate  of  the  pogrom  murderers.  On  December  7,  1907,  to  give  a 
typical  instance,  there  appeared  in  the  same  issue  of  the  Rus- 
sian papers  two  official  telegrams,  one  about  the  trial  and  sen- 
tences of  sixty -two  sailors  that  had  mutinied  a  few  weeks  before 
at  Vladivostock,  the  other  of  fifty-four  ruffians  that  had  parti- 
cipated in  the  murderous  pogrom  of  October,  1905,  in  Mohilev. 
Twenty-four  of  the  ruffians  were  freed,  twenty-four  condemned 
to  short  terms  of  the  mildest  form  of  arrest,  five  to  prison  for 
less  than  eighteen  months,  and  one  to  four  years  of  forced  labour. 
Of  the  sailors  twenty  were,  condemned  to  be  shot,  twenty  were 
condemned  to  terms  of  forced  labour  far  more  severe  than  that 
of  the  one  scapegoat  ruffian  just  mentioned,  and  sixteen  were 


CZARISM   STRUGGLING  FOR   EXISTENCE         4$ 

sentenced  to  arrest.  Thus  sharply  does  the  Russian  Govern- 
ment distinguish  between  a  courageous  revolt  in  the  name  of  a 
high  principle,  and  the  cowardly  massacre  of  unarmed  men, 
women,  and  children  in  the  name  of  racial  hate. 

The  higher  criminals,  as  I  have  said,  were  never  even  sen- 
tenced. Major  Bugadowsky  of  the  gendarmes  was  proved  before 
the  first  Duma  to  have  endeavoured  to  gain  the  favour  of  the 
St.  Petersburg  authorities  by  pointing  out  that  he  had  caused 
to  be  widely  distributed  a  proclamation  calling  on  "all  true 
Russian  people,  those  who  are  for  the  Czar,  the  Fatherland,  and 
the  Orthodox  faith,"  to  gather  togeth-er  at  the  first  alarm  at 
a  designated  place  "with  arms,  scythes,  and  pitchforks"  and  to 
hurl  themselves  under  "the  holy  image  and  the  portrait  of  the 
Czar  "  on  the  common  enemy.  The  major,  confident  of  approval, 
explained  in  his  report  that  he  had  done  "all  in  his  power" 
to  give  the  proclamations  a  wide  circulation,  as  they  would  have 
"a  happy  influence  on  the  peasantry."  Stolypine  explained  to 
the  Duma  that  the  major  had  been  called  to  St.  Petersburg,  but 
as  the  massacre  did  not  actually  take  place  he  could  not  judi- 
cially be  held  responsible!  "As  to  the  rewards  he  received," 
added  the  Czar's  mouthpiece,  "they  were  for  having  reestab- 
lished order." 

Twenty-six  provincial  governors,  all  appointed  in  person 
by  the  Czar,  were  involved.  Of  these  not  one  has  been  punished 
to  this  day,  and  the  two  or  three  that  were  removed  from  the 
reach  of  local  vengeance  were  rewarded  with  high  dignities  else- 
where. The  governor  of  Minsk,  for  example,  has  been  made  a 
member  of  the  council  of  the  interior  with  a  large  salary.  On 
the  contrary,  all  who  did  not  aid  in  the  massacres  were  removed 
by  the  Czar;  as,  for  instance,  the  prefect  of  Sebastopol,  Admiral 
Spitzky,  who  organised  a  militia  to  protect  the  defenceless 
population;  the  governor  of  Samara,  who  would  not  allow 
the  lieutenant-governor  to  bring  the  massacres  into  execution; 
the  governor  of  Ufa,  who  was  removed  for  complaining  to  the 
prime  minister  against  the  preparations  for  the  massacres; 
the  governor  of  Terek,  who,  when  asked  by  a  personage  he  does 
not  name  but  "too  high  to  refuse"  to  prepare  a  massacre, 
preferred  to  be  relieved  of  his  office.  These  cases  of  forced 
resignations  continue  without  interruption. 


46  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Before  the  whole  Witte  ministry  was  forced  out,  Ministers 
Kutler  and  Tolstoi  had  abandoned  all  hope  of  the  Czar  and 
thrown  up  their  offices.  Other  self-respecting  men,  about  the 
same  time  and  since,  have  refused  to  accept  these  humiliating 
ministerial  positions,  including  the  new  influential  leader 
Gutchkov.  These  conservative  leaders,  among  the  strongest 
men  in  Russia,  have  refused  to  become  ministers,  as  I  learned 
from  one  in  person,  just  because  they  know  the  Czarism  and 
the  Czar.  The  position  is  too  humiliating  for  an  honest  and 
self-respecting    man. 

It  is  not  necessary  that  a  minister  should  himself  be  in  direct 
relations  with  the  "patriotic"  leagues,  as  is  usually  the  case. 
He  may  even  be  on  unfriendly  terms  with  them,  but  at  least  he 
must  be  tolerant.  Often  the  right  hand  taketh  not  the  respon- 
sibility for  what  the  left  hand  doeth.  Witte  played  the  part 
of  a  liberal.  His  minister  of  the  Interior,  Dumovo,  was  the  most 
reactionary  the  country  has  had  since  von  Plehve.  I  was  told 
by  a  minister  that  the  two  disagreed  in  every  cabinet  meeting. 
"  But,"  he  reassured  me,  "Witte  gets  his  way  in  three  cases  out 
of  ten."  In  the  other  seven  cases  Durnovo  was  arresting 
workingmen  for  mere  membership  in  the  trade  unions,  sending 
out  Cossack  expeditions  in  all  directions  among  the  peasantry 
to  revenge  the  landlords  for  property  destroyed,  and  exiling 
hundreds  of  persons  a  day  into  Siberia  or  the  mines  on  the 
mere  suspicion  of  the  police.  Lopuchin  has  proved  that  Witte 
was  informed  of  the  preparations  for  massacre  and  neither  took 
effective  measures  to  prevent  them  nor  honourably  resigned. 
Witte  even  claimed  in  my  presence  and  that  of  a  third  person 
that  it  was  not  the  Government  but  the  whole  nation  that  was 
aroused  against  the  Jews! 

Stoly pine's  brother,  editor  of  the  chief  reactionary  organ 
in  Russia,  although  he  finds  inadmissible  the  permanent  cooper- 
ation of  the  Government  with  the  murderers,  confesses  that  in 
a  crisis  there  is  "no  other  choice  than  an  appeal  to  the  League 
of  Russian  Men."  To  save  the  Czar  and  Czarism,  then,  the 
minister  must  always  be  ready  to  descend  to  the  principles  of 
the  St.  Bartholomew  massacre,  the  Mafia  or  the  Spanish  Inqm- 
sition.  This  is  why,  since  the  beginning  of  the  Stoly  pine  minis- 
try, a  helping  hand  has  been  frequently  extended  to  the  League 


CZARISM   STRUGGLING   FOR   EXISTENCE         47 

from  the  Central  Government,  to  say  nothing  of  the  intimate 
relations  encouraged  in  almost  every  local  government  between 
the  officials  and  the  local  leaders  of  the  league.  This  is  also 
why,  in  both  Duma  elections  under  the  Stolypine  regime,  the 
league  has  been  favoured  in  every  possible  manner.  Its  local 
branches  all  over  Russia  were  twice  endowed  with  large  sums 
directly  by  the  Government,  its  conservative  rivals  were  appealed 
to  by  the  St.  Petersburg  authorities  to  ally  themselves  with  the 
league  in  the  elections,  and  in  many  places  all  popular  or  liberal 
rivals  were  crushed  by  the  arbitrary  arrest  of  the  candidates 
or  the  wholesale  striking  of  electors  off  the  lists. 

After  the  great  massacres  following  the  Manifesto,  there 
was  a  brief  respite.  There  were  two  reasons  for  postponing 
further  killings.  Chie  was  the  financial  needs  of  Russia.  Too 
much  bloodshed  would  have  made  it  difficult  for  Russia  to  bor- 
row the  billion  rubles  she  obtained  from  France  and  other  coun- 
tries the  following  spring.  Too  many  official  crimes  would  have 
made  the  Duma  elections  impossible,  or  made  them  still  less 
favourable  to  the  Government,  and  would  have  destroyed  the 
object  for  which  the  Duma  was  created,  to  give  the  Czarism  an 
artificial  credit  abroad  for  money  and  military  allies.  Not- 
withstanding these  weighty  reasons,  it  was  all  that  Witte  could 
do  to  restrain  the  Czar's  over-zealous  friends  in  the  bureaucracy 
and  the  court.  The  plotting  and  planning  went  on,  as  was 
exposed  later  in  the  Duma  by  Prince  Urussov.  Finally  the 
"patriots,"  patience  gave  way  and  the  world  was  treated  to  the 
grandiose  massacre  of  Bielostock.  In  this  three  days*  massa- 
cre nearly  a  hundred  persons  were  killed  and  as  many  more 
seriously  mutilated. 

The  Bielostock  pogrom  was  foreseen,  as  pogroms  always  are, 
several  days  before  it  occurred,  and  the  leading  and  most 
respected  citizens  did  all  they  could  to  persuade  the  local 
authorities  to  stop  it.  They  obtained  little  satisfaction. 
Governor  Kister,  when  complained  to,  refused  to  do  anything; 
and  even  after  his  brief  visit  to  Bielostock  by  a  special  train 
during  the  massacre,  the  slaughter  continued.  He  doubtless 
knew  be  would  not  be  permitted  to  act.  The  chief  of  police, 
Rodetzki,  who  was  opposed  to  the  pogrom,  resigned  on  the  very 
morning  of  the  massacre  and  was  replaced  by  a  "surer'*  man. 


48  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Shortly  before  the  massacre  one  of  the  colonels  stationed 
at  Bielostock  said  to  his  soldiers:  "You  are  defending  the  Czar 
and  the  Fatherland.  The  Jews  want  to  kill  you.  They  have 
decided  to  exterminate  you  to  the  last  man.  I  announce  to  you 
that  the  authorities  give  you  the  right  to  do  whatever  you  please 
on  the  21  St  of  this  month.''  This  colonel  knew  his  Government 
and  his  Czar.  He  knew  he  would  be  thanked  for  his  bloody 
work  and  given  other  opportunities  in  the  future  to  rise.  He 
was  not  disappointed  —  as  we  shall  see. 

The  Bielostock  pogrom  was  fully  investigated  and  exposed 
by  the  Duma,  then  in  session.  The  Duma  branded  the  official 
report  as  a  tissue  of  lies.  The  investigators  found  that  the 
troops  were  present,  calm  and  impassible,  at  all  the  crimes  of 
the  massacre.  While  the  police  and  ruffians  murdered,  muti- 
lated and  plundered,  they  swept  the  streets  with  volleys  "to 
keep  away  the  Jews."  The  Duma  decided  that  the  pogrom  was 
not  only  due  to  the  officials,  hut  solely  due  to  them,  that,  con- 
trary to  the  Government  report,  there  was  no  racial,  religious, 
or  economic  enmity  between  the  Christians  and  the  Jews,  that 
this  hatred  existed  only  among  the  police ;  that  the  police  knew 
all  about  the  preparation  for  the  massacre,  and  they  them- 
selves murdered  and  robbed;  and  that  the  troops  shot  down 
peaceable  men,  women,  and  children  without  the  slightest  cause. 

But  the  Czar  knew  how  to  show  that  he  was  pleased  by  the 
massacre  and  suited  by  the  official  report.  The  guilty  troops 
were  at  once  sent  his  special  and  public  thanks,  as  was  noted 
in  the  official  army  journal  of  July  9,  1906.  The  mayor  of 
the  town  was  removed  for  questioning  the  truth  of  the  official 
report.  The  CathoHc  Archbishop  Ropp,  who  reported  a  meet- 
ing of  those  who  were  preparing  the  massacre,  has  been  followed 
by  the  imperial  vengeance  until  this  day.  Only  recently  he 
was  forced  out  of  his  office  on  a  trivial  pretext,  even  against 
the  protest  of  the  Vatican. 

The  penalties  for  the  atrocious  mutilations  at  Bielostock 
are  significant.  Here  is  the  sum  total  for  the  punishment: 
One  prisoner  received  a  rather  severe  sentence  at  hard  labour, 
eight  years  —  which,  of  course,  may  be  later  shortened  by  the 
Czar.  One  received  a  sentence  of  eight  months  in  prison.  The 
penalties  of  the  others  were  nominal.     Six  were  let  go,  three 


BARON    TAUBE    AND    PICTURES   HE    SENT   HIS    FIANCEE    TO     SHOW 

HOW   HE   DEALT    WITH    PEASANTS 

He  wrote  under  the  pictures:  "Bringing  the   man  to  execution."     "Thev  are 

preparing  to  shoot;  the  men  are  at  their  places."     "They  are  firing  the  second 

time;  he  is  already  dead."     These  pictures  were  produced  before  the  first  Duma 

by  Alexinsky  and  caused  a  great  sensation 


OF  THE         ' 

liVERSITY 


CZARISM   STRUGOLING   FOR   EXISTENCE         49 

given  three  months  in  the  disciplinary  battalions.  Two  of  the 
leaders,  Popko  and  Peredo,  along  with  several  others,  although 
under  accusation  were  not  kept  locked  up  for  the  trial  — • 
*' which  circumstance,"  laconically  explained  the  gagged  Russian 
press,  "much  favoured  their  escape." 

For  a  time  the  forces  of  reaction  and  massacre  were  some- 
what frightened  by  the  Duma's  uproar  about  the  Bielostock 
affair.  But  soon  they  were  at  work  again.  The  first  to  act 
were,  not  unnaturally,  the  brave  troops  of  Bielostock,  one  regi- 
ment of  which  was  now  transported  to  Siedlice  in  Poland.  A 
frightful  pogrom  followed  this  transfer,  this  time  entirely  and 
solely  carried  out  by  the  troops,  as  shown  by  two  official  reports. 
As  is  proved  by  one  of  these,  Colonel  Tichanovsky,  the  chief  of 
the  garrison,  called  a  conference  before  the  pogrom,  in  which 
he  exposed  his  bloody  plans,  and  answered  every  protest  of  one 
or  two  subordinates  by  a  promise  that  he  would  assume  full 
responsibility.  This  meant  that  he  was  sure  of  support  higher 
up.  The  governor  was  complained  to  without  result  and  the 
massacre  put  deliberately  into  execution.  During  the  whole- 
sale butcheries  by  the  drunken  soldiers  in  the  houses  and  on 
the  streets,  Colonel  Tichanovsky  gathered  together  a  soldiers' 
chorus  "to  raise  the  spirits  of  the  troops,"  and  "their  singing 
resounded  amidst  the  noise  of  the  rifles,  the  spilling  of  blood, 
the  plundering  and  conflagration."  The  colonel  said  that 
*'in  case  he  was  killed  he  hoped  the  soldiers  would  honour  his 
memory  decently  and  bathe  themselves  up  to  the  ears  in  blood." 
Though  the  killed  and  wounded  amounted  to  hundreds,  while 
only  a  single  soldier  lost  his  life,  the  colonel  complained  that 
there  were  too  few  dead.  This  is  how  Colonel  Tichanovsky  at 
least,  given  supreme  authority  by  his  superior,  interpreted 
the  personal  thanks  of  the  Czar  for  loyal  services  at  Bielostock. 

But  now  Stolypine  was  in  office.  However  humiliating 
the  position  he  occupied  along  with  all  other  ministers  in  the 
court,  and  however  helpless  he  was  against  the  Czar,  Stoly- 
pine saw  with  the  minister  of  war  that  this  particular  manner 
of  conducting  these  campaigns  against  the  "internal  enemy" 
was  a  dangerous,  disintegrating  force  of  the  army  itself.  Already 
at  Siedlice  there  was  a  threatening  minority  of  the  officers  against 
the  massacre.     The  soldiers  of  a  whole  regiment  scarcely  took  a 


50  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

hand  in  the  business.  A  little  more  and  there  could  have  been 
a  mutiny  and  the  military  massacres  would  have  turned  into  a 
revolutionary   movement. 

Siedlice  was  the  last  military  pogrom.  We  have  now  in 
the  place  of  this  short-lived  institution  the  cherished  politics 
of  the  League  of  Russian  Men,  the  arming^  of  the  dregsjjf  the 
population,  and  the  steady  beating  and  murder  under  the  pro- 
;'  teciion  of  the  police  of  all  persons  "unfriendly  "  to  the  Govem- 
i  ment.  The  new  system,  which  prevails  at  a  hundred  different 
points  at  once,  received  the  sanction  of  the  Czar,  this  time 
so  openly  and  clearly  that  he  could  be  sentenced  for  partici- 
pation in  the  crimes  before  any  honest  jury  or  court. 


CHAPTER  ly 

THE  SLOW  MASSACRE  SYSTEM 

THIS  new  "slow  massacre"  system,  always  popular,  has 
now  been  supreme  for  over  a  year,  and  promises  to  remain 
an  indispensable  arm  of  the  Government.  Recently  in  Vologda, 
for  instance,  a  respected  citizen  went  to  the  governor  to  com- 
plain of  the  beatings  the  league  was  executing  daily  on  the 
streets.  As  an  answer  he  was  sentenced  to  a  month's  imprison- 
ment. Of  course  there  is  a  party  that  prefers  an  intensification 
of  martial  law  to  this  lynch  justice  of  the  dregs,  and  a  reaction- 
ary group  in  the  Duma  has  recently  petitioned  to  this  effect. 
But  martial  law  means  a  setting  aside  of  civil  government, 
and  even  the  existing  chaotic  "system"  of  the  bureaus,  plus 
the  daily  semi-official  murder  of  liberal  citizens  on  the  streets, 
is  better  than  the  utter  arbitrariness  of  a  state  of  war.  The 
first  demand  of  the  moderately  liberal  members  of  the  Duma 
is  not  the  extension  but  the  abolition  of  martial  law,  since  it 
bears  down  not  on  the  "internal  enemy"  alone,  but  on  the 
whole  community.  There  is,  then,  no  alternative  for  a  poor 
Czarism  harassed  for  its  existence.  The  army  cannot  be  used 
quickly  to  put  an  end  to  the  business,  for  that  leads  to  military 
disorganisation  and  revolt.  It  cannot  be  used  to  govern  the 
country,  for  the  price  of  its  arbitrariness  falls  alike  on  the  just 
'  and  the  unjust.  The  internal  enemy  must  be  left  to  the  police 
land  such  voluntary  allies  as  they  can  procure  themselves  from 
I  the  criminal  class. 

In  the  first  year  of  the  national  organisation  of  the  counter- 
revolution on  this  principle,  and  before  its  universal  adoption 
made  it  impossible  to  enumerate  farther,  there  were  over  six 
hundred  of  these  "patriotic  demonstrations,"  $25,000,000 
worth  of  property  was  destroyed,  over  a  thousand  persons  were 
killed  and  several  thousand  seriously  or  permanently  injured; 
of  Jewish  families  alone  thirty-seven  thousand  were  affected. 

51 


52 


RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 


It  is  unfortunate  that  the  figures  do  not  show  what  was  the 
part  played  by  the  employees  of  the  Government  and  what  by 
the  organised  mob.  There  can  be  little  question  that  a  large 
part,  if  not  most,  of  the  actual  killing  was  done  by  the  hands  of 
officials,  police,  soldiers,  spies,  and  Government  employees  in 
disguise.  The  massacres  were  so  similar  it  seems  likely  that 
even  the  details  were  studied  and  ordered  by  the  central  commit- 
tee; they  were  'enough  like  those  already  mentioned  not  to 
need  description  here. 

The  new  development  of  the  "system"  as  practised  in  Odessa 

rests  upon  a  triple  basis  of  the  Czar's  patronage:    his  direct 

,  relationship  with  the  organisation  that  prepares  the  massacres, 

)the  favours  he  extends  to  his  leaders  personally,  and  the  pardons 

I  he  distributes  freely  to  any  of  the  murderers  themselves  who 

•  may  be  sentenced  through  the  occasional  ignorance  or  simplicity 

•  of  some  honest  court.  The  active  aid  of  Stolypine,  who  claims 
to  oppose  it,  is  not  necessary ;  with  the  Czar's  personal  relation- 
ships, favours  and  pardons,  Stolypine,  who  is  only  a  minister, 
has  nothing  to  do.  Moreover,  the  people's  Duma  has  been 
abolished  and  nearly  a  hundred  of  the  four  hundred  members  of 
the  new  "landlord's  Duma  "  are  members  of  the  massacre  organ- 

^  isations,  while  the  majority  of  the  rest  are  ultra-conservative 
,  officials,  noblemen,  and  privileged  persons  precisely  in  the 
]  situation  of  Stolypine,  that  is,  without  either  thejv^iU.or  ppyer 

•  to  combat  the  Czar.  Thus,  having  no  influential  opposition, 
the  Odessa  system  will  continue  to  reveal  daily  the  life  principle 
of  the  autocratic  State. 

In  Odessa  at  the  present  moment  everything  reminds  us  of 
the  St.  Bartholomew  massacre  and  the  league  during  the  civil 
and  religious  wars  three  centuries  ago  in  France.  Odessa  is 
the  chief  stronghold  of  the  league  and  Stolypine  is  naturally 
jealous,  as  it  is  his  chief  rival  for  the  favour  of  the  Czar.  So 
bitter  is  the  mutual  jealousy  that  Konovnitzin,  the  local  presi- 
dent of  the  league,  has  now  brought  an  important  legal  suit 
against  Stolypine  for  a  criminal  non-enforcement  of  anti-Jewish 
laws.  Stolypine  has  naturally  made  a  counter  attack  and 
recently  exposed  in  full  the  Odessa  excesses  to  the  Czar  ^-  not 
out  of  any  kindness  of  heart,  be  it  remarked,  for  when  Stolypine 
was  governor  of  Saratov  he  permitted  the  burning  of  towns  and 


THE   SLOW   MASSACRE   SYSTEM  53 

the  wildest  excesses  by  the  Cossacks  and  the  hired  mob.  But 
the  prime  minister  could  do  nothing  to  shake  the  Czar's  con- 
fidence in  the  organisation  that  so  nearly  responds  to  his  desires, 
and  he  has  allowed  nothing  to  interfere  either  with  Governor 
Kaulbars  or  the  Odessa  branch. 

Even  among  the  officials  there  are  a  few  good  men  who  have 
/made  complaint  —  but  their  voices  are  drowned  in  the  reaction- 
ary chorus  of  the  Czar's  favourites.  The  civil  governor  of  the 
province  that  contains  Odessa,  one  Malajew,  exclaims  to  little 
purpose:  "We  cannot  close  our  eyes.  Among  all  the  races 
the  Jews  are  the  most  oppressed  and  circumscribed.  We 
need  not  fear  them,  but  ourselves.  One  is  astonished  not  at  the 
grumblings  but  at  the  mildness  of  these  people.  We  must  do 
them  justice,  we  must  give  them  the  right  to  live  and  breathe." 

Grigoriev,  until  recently  chief  of  police,  strove  in  vain  to 
do  his  duty  and  prevent  the  daily  slaughter  of  the  Jews.  He 
finally  went  to  Stolypine  to  report  that  he  could  do  nothing 
against  Kaulbars  and  that  either  he  or  Kaulbars  must  go. 
"Then  you  resign,"  replied  Stolypine,  aware  of  Kaulbars's 
unshakable  position  with  the  Czar.  Grigoriev  resigned.  I 
arrived  in  Odessa  a  few  months  ago  on  the  same  train  with  the 
new  chief  Novitzki,  who  came  with  special  secret  orders  from 
Stolypine,  directed  mainly  of  course  against  the  league.  The 
town  had  almost  declared  a  holiday.  The  streets  were  lined 
with  thousands  of  people  to  welcome  their  last  hope.  But  the 
daily  massacres  have  continued  and  Novitzki  has  had  to  give 
up  in  despair.  He  failed  above  all  to  muzzle  the  press  of  the 
league  that  calls  for  massacre  from  day  to  day.  The  head' 
of  the  censorship  in  St.  Petersburg  complained  of  this  paper 
and  Novitzki  issued  the  order  to  suppress  it,  but  Konovnitzin,. 
safe  under  the  protection  of  Kaulbars,  refused  to  recognise  the 
order. 

All  the  other  leading  criminals  are  also  immediately  under 
the  governor's  protection.  Last  year,  for  instance,  the  secre- 
tary of  the  league,  Kahov,  was  arrested  for  distributing  proc- 
lamations calling  for  the  massacre  of  the  Jews.  Kahov 's 
brother  entered  the  police  headquarters,  abused  the  police, 
called  up  the  governor  of  that  time  by  telephone  and  made  a 
complaint.     Immediately  after  this  he  had  a  personal  conference 


54  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

with  the  governor  and  his  brother  was  released.  This  governor, 
tired  of  his  strenuous  duties,  resigned,  and  was  later  killed. 
He  is  acknowledged,  even  in  reactionary  circles,  to  have  been 
a  brute.  But  in  his  successor,  Kaulbars,  the  Czar  has  found 
another  man  just  as  much  to  his  taste.  Recently  a  well-known 
and  respectable  citizen  received  threatening  letters  from  the 
league.  He  called  on  Kaulbars.  The  governor  in  his  presence 
called  up  one  of  the  chiefs  of  the  criminals  familiarly  by  tele- 
phone and  told  him  not  to  touch  this  particular  man.  Kaulbars *s 
position  in  court,  along  with  several  other  magnates  of  his 
character,  remains  as  firm  as  the  grand  dukes'.  When  a  dele- 
gation from  Poland  went  to  complain  against  Governor  Skalon, 
Stolypine  received  its  members  with  evasive  answers  and  left 
the  room.  A  minister  who  had  been  present  asked  them  why 
they  complained  to  Stolypine  and  if  they  could  possibly  be  so 
ignorant  as  not  to  know  that  Skalon  was  protected  higher  up. 
It  is  the  same  with  Kaulbars ;  he  is  protected  by  the  **  Most  High." 

The  situation  that  has  arisen  in  Odessa  is  by  far  the  most 
damning  to  the  Government  of  all  the  varied  and  innumer- 
able horrors  it  has  created.  After  a  massacre  last  June  the 
league  organ,  For  Czar  and  Fatherland ,  declared  quite  truth- 
fully that  the  organisation  would  act  in  the  same  way  in  the 
future.  The  continuous  massacre  began  at  once  to  increase  its 
daily  toll.  By  August  the  murderers  were  in  such  complete 
possession  of  the  city  that  not  even  officials  were  respected. 
A  teacher  of  the  military  school  wearing  his  uniform  pointed 
out  to  the  police  how  members  of  the  league  at  that  moment,  in 
broad  daylight  and  the  centre  of  the  city,  were  beating  Jews. 
The  murderers  by  the  grace  of  the  Czar  then  began  to  beat  the 
-teacher  before  the  eyes  of  the  police.  He  fled,  his  face  stream- 
ing with  blood,  into  a  leading  hotel  near  the  palace  of  the 
governor-general.  The  hotel  was  filled  with  high  officials. 
Nevertheless  the  league  members  surrounded  it  and  threatened 
to  bombard  if  their  prey  was  not  surrendered.  Two  military 
officers  tried  to  calm  them  in  vain.  Finally  the  proposed 
victim  was  saved  by  the  chance  appearance  of  the  assistant 
prosecuting  attorney. 

During  the  massacre  on  the  3rd,  4th,  and  5th  of  September,  in 
which  many  were  killed  and  still  more  mutilated  by  the  new 


THE   SLOW   MASSACRE    SYSTEM  55 

curved  knives  and  clubs  of  rubber  and  wire  that  break  noses 
and  beat  out  eyes,  one  of  the  leaders  arrested  in  the  act  of  plun- 
der was  let  off  merely  with  a  "fatherly  warning"  by  Kaulbars. 
The  league  issued  an  appeal  in  which  it  ominously  recommended 
to  those  Jews  who  wanted  to  preserve  their  lives  and  property 
"to  gather  themselves  together  with  the  teachers  and  rabbis  in 
the  synagogue  and  to  publicly  call  down  a  curse  on  all  the 
revolutionaries  and  educated  Jews,  to  forget  all  their  clamourings 
for  equal  rights  with  the  Christians,  and  to  form  a  league  of  Jews 
for  the  maintenance  of  the  unlimited  autocracy  of  the  Czar.** 

"Since  the  revolutionists  are  invisible,"  said  the  Count  Mus- 
sin-Puschkin,  "we  must  strike  at  the  public."  For  striking  at 
the  public  the  league  has  in  Odessa  a  fighting  organisation  of 
three  hundred  men  armed  by  the  governor  and  given  head- 
quarters in  a  government  building.  Besides  this  band,  all  very 
young  men  and  some  mere  boys,  there  is  a  student  detachment 
of  eighty  members.  These  are  permitted  publicly,  as  many  of 
the  other  two  thousand  members  are  permitted  secretly,  to 
carry  arms.  But  the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  ordinary 
members  are  simply  the  young  toughs  and  rowdies  of  a  great 
port.  The  members  of  the  fighting  organisation  are  paid  fifteen 
to  twenty  dollars  a  month,  a  goodly  wage  in  a  starving  country. 
Their  duties  consist  especially  in  revenging  on  the  general  pub- 
lic the  killing  of  police  by  unknown  anarchist  or  revolutionary 
groups.  A  recent  "order"  gives  the  following  scale:  for  each 
policeman  killed  two  Jews,  for  each  roundsman  four,  for  a 
captain  eight,  for  the  chief  of  police  still  a  larger  number,  and 
in  the  case  of  the  assassination  of  Konovnitzin  or  Kaulbars  a 
general  massacre.  The  scale  is  not  literally  carried  out,  but  if 
we  substitute  two  Jews  seriously  wounded  for  one  killed  it  is 
executed  almost  to  the  letter. 

The  league  murderers,  who  often  wear  a  yellow  jacket  as 
a  uniform,  are  organised  under  three  captains  or  "attamans." 
It  was  to  one  of  these  that  Kaulbars  gave  the  telephone  order 
already  referred  to.  Another,  Gazabatov,  a  typical  western 
**bad  man"  nineteen  years  of  age,  who  even  killed  a  five-year- 
old  child,  was  recently  once  more  released  from  prison  by  Kaul- 
bars. Under  assumed  but  well  known  names  he  and  another 
attaman  sell  passes  of  safety   from  massacre.     Nothing  else 


56  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

secures  one's  life  in  Odessa  now.  An  American  friend  recently 
saw  a  ruffian  beat  a  man  in  the  face.  With  the  blood  streaming 
the  victim  called  for  help  and  a  crowd  was  soon  giving  chase. 
My  friend  joined  in.  Soon  a  policeman  was  reached.  When 
appealed  to  he  threatened  the  crowd,  which  he  said  he  considered 
to  be  a  mob,  that  he  would  call  the  Cossacks,  and  in  the  mean- 
while the  criminal  escaped.  Another  policeman  when  asked 
in  a  similar  case  why  he  did  not  arrest  the  criminal  replied: 
"Why,  don't  you  know,  he's  one  of  ours?" 
;  Let  the  reader  note  carefully  each  turn  of  events  in  the 
following  outbreak,  which  occurred  in  Odessa,  and  he  will 
understand  the  nature  of  that  basic  institution  of  Czarism, 
the  pogrom. 

As  the  body  of  a  police  officer,  assassinated  for  an  unknown 
cause,  passed  the  Jewish  hospital  shots  resounded.  This  firing 
shots  near  a  Jewish  house  is  a  regular  feature  of  the  massacres, 
and  in  several  cases,  as  at  Bielostock,  it  has  been  proved  that 
the  shots  were  fired  by  a  hidden  agent  of  the  police.  There 
began  a  fusillade.  Several  shots  hit  the  coffin  and  the  corpse, 
hut  not  one  of  the  leaguers  was  touched!  There  was  a  wild  panic ; 
soon  all  the  streets  were  deserted  and  all  the  shops  closed. 
A  group  of  the  "yellow  jackets "  forced  its  way  into  the  hospital, 
with  revolvers  in  their  hands.  The  police  appeared  with  the 
Cossacks  and  put  an  end  to  the  scandal,  hut  they  arrested  nobody. 
The  league  members  retreated  still  shooting,  and  a  fourteen- 
year-old  girl  and  a  man  of  seventy-eight  were  wounded.  Not- 
withstanding all  those  warnings  to  the  authorities,  the  disorders 
were  repeated,  unhindered,  the  next  day.  Again  there  was  a 
fusillade,  an  old  Jew  and  an  eight-year-old  girl  were  killed, 
several  Jews  were  wounded  and  many  beaten.  This  occurred 
in  the  morning.  At  one  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  the  beatings 
began  again;  carriages  and  street-cars  were  held  up  and  men 
and  women  passengers  attacked.  At  two  o'clock  a  funeral  ap- 
peared accompanied  by  the  Chief  of  Police  Novitzki,  by  Cossacks, 
and  by  a  large  number  of  mounted  police.  As  the  procession 
neared  the  hospital  again  the  traditional  shots  resounded,  and 
a  Jewish  boy  was  severely  wounded.  After  the  funeral  a  crowd 
of  yellow  jackets  again  began  beating  and  shooting  in  the  streets, 
a  young  girl  was  wounded  and  a  Jew  killed  before  the  police 


THE   SLOW   MASSACRE   SYSTEM  57 

put  in  their  tardy  appearance.  For  this  carnival  of  crime 
ten  members  of  the  league  were  taken  into  custody  and  sen- 
tenced to  two  months'  arrest,  doubtless,  as  usual,  in  the  very 
headquarters  of  their  friends  the  police. 

The  official  account  of  this  affair,  without  mentioning  the 
league,  puts  the  whole  responsibility,  as  is  commonly  done, 
on  the  murdered  Jews.  It  begins  as  usual  with  a  totally  irrele- 
vant accotmt  of  the  shooting  of  a  policeman,  for  which  the 
massacre  is  supposed  to  be  the  revenge  —  carried  out  by  the 
Christian  population  of  Odessa.  Although  the  said  assault  took 
place  after  dark  and  the  assailants  escaped,  the  police  never- 
theless characterised  them  as  Jews. 

**0n  September  ist,"  says  this  report,  "a  detective  named 
Vemik  was  passing  about  eight  o'clock  in  the  evening  through 
Portof ranco  Street  when  he  noticed  two  Jews  stealthily  approach- 
ing him.  .  .  .  One  drew  a  revolver  and  shot  Vemik  in  the 
left  side.  They  then  escaped.  .  .  .  The  next  day  two  or 
three  Jews  roaming  through  the  street  fired  several  more  shots 
and  then  escaped  into  the  crowd.  .  .  .  When  the  body  of 
the  dead  Kharchenko  was  carried  in  front  of  the  Jewish  hospital, 
a  group  of  Jews  opened  fire  at  the  squad  of  police."  This  report, 
as  are  all  pohce  reports  of  such  affairs,  was  nothing  more  nor 
less  than  clear  invitation  to  repeat  the  massacre  of  the  Jews. 

The  police  incitement  was  successful  in  stirring  up  a  massacre 
within  a  few  days.  In  this  affair  the  same  performance,  even 
to  the  fimeral,  was  repeated,  and  in  addition  several  hundred 
shops  were  plundered  or  destroyed.  In  the  police  report, 
since  the  "yellow jackets"  did  all  the  killing  and  the  Jews 
only  furnished  the  killed,  the  latter  are  scarcely  mentioned. 
It  says  that  "individuals"  forced  their  way  into  a  tea-room 
and  wounded  two  "persons,"  that  a  "man"  was  wounded  on 
the  street,  that  the  "crowd"  destroyed  various  windows,  that 
a  certain  "  Stcherbakov  "  received  a  woimd.  Nobody  familiar 
with  the  situation  would  question  that  the  "individuals"  and 
the  "crowd"  were  leaguers,  while  the  "persons,"  the  "man" 
and  "Stcherbakov"  were  all  imfortunate  Jews. 

In  the  report  of  the  massacre  of  the  following  week,  the 
police  again  referred  to  the  Jews  six  times  in  the  brief  space 
of  a  few  hundred  words.     But  it  must  be  by  no  means  inferred 


58  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

that  the  Jews  are  the  only  subject  of  attack  by  the  yellow 
jackets  and  police.  A  Russian  smith  who  asked  a  mob  of  yellow 
jackets  who  were  beating  some  Jews  what  offence  these  Jews  had 
committed,  was  at  once  disembowelled  by  the  mob.  Three 
Russian  workingmen  were  attacked  in  the  house  of  the  mother 
of  two  of  them,  and  the  mother  and  small  sister  were  beaten. 
The  mother  died  and  it  is  doubtful  if  the  men  will  ever  recover 
from  their  mistreatment. 

While  these  massacres  go  on  in  the  streets,  while  Kaulbars 
is  sitting  in  council  with  the  league  in  the  governor's  palace, 
the  life  of  Odessa  has  naturally  become  a  chaos.  During  the 
sessions  of  the  town  council,  the  members  of  the  League  of 
Russian  Men  sit  in  the  gallery  and  interrupt  and  terrorise  the 
progressive  members,  while  armed  reinforcements  are  waiting 
outside  in  front  of  the  building.  Three  newspapers  were  con- 
fiscated for  mentioning  the  names  of  the  liberal  candidates 
for  the  Duma  and  their  editors  thrown  in  prison,  along  with 
one  of  the  candidates  himself.  For  Czar  and  Fatherland,  the 
League  newspaper,  appears  daily  with  the  words  of  the  Czar's 
famous  telegram  at  the  top:  "The  League  of  Russian  Men  will 
be  my  most  faithful  support,"  and  on  the  next  page,  "Smash 
the  Jews,  Socialists,  Caduks   (Cadets),  and  other  reptiles." 

The  anarchy  in  Odessa,  unequalled  in  any  city  of  Europe 
in  modem  times,  unless  in  Constantinople,  is  no  worse  than  in 
many  other  of  the  eighty-two  (out  of  eighty-six)  provinces  of 
the  Russian  Empire  that  are  now  entering  into  the  third  year 
of  "government"  by  martial  law.  It  may  well  be  disputed 
whether  the  martial  law  has  brought  on  the  anarchy,  or  the 
anarchy  the  martial  law.  But  it  cannot  be  questioned  that 
both  are  the  inevitable  results  of  the  anarchy  of  the  Russian 
bureaucracy  and  the  government  by  violence  which  history 
shows  constitutes  the  ideal  of  the  true  courtier  and  the  true  Czar. 


CHAPTER  V 

CREATING    THE     "  INTERNAL    ENEMY" 

IN  A  recent  conversation  with  the  Czar  which  was  at  once 
careftilly  written  down  by  the  Countess  Tolstoi,  Nicholas 
said: 

"I  am  very  sorry  that  in  the  course  of  the  last  revolts  and 
the  massacres  of  the  Jews  public  opinion  of  that  great  country 
(America)  has  turned  against  me.  I  am  not  guilty  of  all  those 
troubles.  I  think  the  Jews  themselves  incite  the  mob  to  attack 
them.  The  time  will  come  when  the  Americans  themselves  will 
hate  the  Jews  and  regard  them,  not  as  a  nation  of  great  intelli- 
gence and  isolated  from  the  others  through  their  religion,  but 
as  the  worst  type  of  business-men  and  money-makers.  All  the 
revolts  of  the  last  two  years  have  been  agitated  by  the  Jews. 
A  Jew  in  common  life  may  be  good,  but  a  Jew  in  politics  is 
worse  than  anyone  else." 

Before  exposing  the  roots  of  the  gospel  of  religious  and  race 
hatred  here  openly  preached  by  the  Czar,  let  us  read  what  is 
clearly  expressed  between  the  lines.  The  Czar  was  talking  not 
in  the  abstract  but  of  the  situation  in  Russia  at  the  present 
moment,  and  we  would  lose  half  the  value  of  what  he  says  if 
we  did  not  recall  just  what  questions  he  is  answering  and  what 
the  situation  is  to  which  he  refers. 

To  begin  with,  most  of  his  remarks  cannot  apply  only  to  the 
Jews.  If  he  expresses  himself  fully  Nicholas  must  say  he  is 
sorry  that  "in  the  course  of  the  recent  revolts  and  the  massacres ** 
of  the  Poles,  Lithuanians,  Esths,  Letts,  Tartars,  Georgians,  and 
Armenians,  the  opinion  of  America  and  of  the  whole  civilised 
world  has  turned  against  him.  Neither  he  nor  anyone  speaking 
for  him  has  ever  withdrawn  the  accusation  constantly  issued 
by  the  officials  that  each  one  of  these  peoples  has  also  agitated 
revolts.  Nor  has  is  ever  been  denied  that  their  rebellious 
tendency  is  the  reason  why  all  non-Russian  peoples  are  more 

59 


6o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

or  less  disqualified  in  the  new  Duma  and  legally  persecuted  by 
the  courts.  In  speaking  of  the  Jews  as  if  they  stood  alone  then, 
Nicholas  creates  an  impression  the  exact  reverse  of  the  fact 
by  failing  to  state  the  "whole  truth."  Sworn  before  an  Ameri- 
can court  he  would  stand  convicted  of  the  crime  of  common 
perjury. 

This  is  a  fine  specimen  of  the  kind  of  lie  by  which  the  Czarism 
is  trying  to  save  itself.  If  the  Jews,  as  the  Czar  implies,  are 
hated  by  all  the  peoples  in  Russia,  it  looks  badly  for  the  Russian 
Jews.  But  if  all  the  non-Russian  peoples  in  Russia  hate  the 
Government  and  the  Czar,  and  do  not  hate  the  Jews,  then  the 
overwhelming  presumption  is  against  the  Government  and  the 
Czar.  All  the  other  false  impressions  created  by  this  little  gem 
of  falsehood  are  made  doubly  vicious  by  this  first  general  lie 
of  omission  that  underlies  every  word.  The  great  Autocrat 
finds  it  inconvenient  to  mention  the  other  "subject"  races 
because  had  he  done  so  his  attack  would  have  appeared  on  its 
face  so  vicious  and  absurd  that  it  would  have  sufficed  in  itself 
to  convince  any  thinking  person  of  the  malicious  hostility  of 
the  Czar  toward  all  who  for  any  reason  oppose  him. 

Who  is  guilty  of  the  massacres  according  to  Nicholas?  The 
Czar  says  he  is  not.  He  says  the  Jews  are  partly  guilty,  not 
daring,  as  do  many  of  his  officials,  to  put  all  the  blame  on  them. 
The  accusation  that  the  Jews  are  bringing  about  the  massacres, 
of  which  they  are  often  the  only  victims,  is  ridiculous  on  the 
face  of  it  and  a  monstrous  perversion  of  facts  with  which,  as 
I  have  shown,  the  Czar  himself  is  perfectly  familiar.  Did  not 
the  Czar  excuse  his  officials  for  the  Bielostock  pogrom,  not  on 
the  ground  that  the  Jews  had  incited  an  imaginary  mob  to 
massacre  them,  but  that  the  Jews  were  "republicans  and 
revolutionists"?  How  are  we  to  know  when  Nicholas  speaks 
the  truth?  Does  he  hold  that  the  Jews  incite  the  massacres, 
or  that  the  Jews  are  against  Czarism  and  therefore  ought  to 
be  massacred? 

But  if,  as  he  says,  to  the  Jews  is  due  only  a  part  of  the  guilt, 
where  is  the  rest  of  it?  The  Czar  does  not  assume  for  his  own 
Government  any  part  of  the  responsibility,  and  has  not  caused 
a  single  official  of  any  consequence  to  be  punished  for  these 
crimes.     Where  is  the  missing  guilt?     Does  it  belong  to  the 


■     CREATING   THE    "INTERNAL   ENEMY"  6i 

mobs?  But  often  there  were  no  mobs,  and  in  nearly  every 
case  where  so-called  mobs  existed  they  were  composed  of  the 
members  of  the  League  of  Russian  Men  whom  Nicholas 
has  since  pardoned,  because  such  criminals  are  an  indispen- 
sable element  in  what  he  considers  to  be  "the  best  party" 
in  the   country. 

Then  comes  the  effort  of  the  Emperor  to  stir  up  race  hatred, 
the  basis  of  his  own  power,  in  the  United  States.  The  Czarism 
is  like  an  infectious  disease,  a  sort  of  black  death.  It  tends  to 
spread  its  putrefaction  in  all  directions,  encourages  by  its 
military  power  the  reactionary  influence  in  Prussia,  Poland, 
Hungary  and  even  the  horrible  jacqueries  of  Roumania,  corrupts 
with  high  interest  on  its  loans  the  small  bourgeoisie  of  France, 
and  now  hopes  to  defend  itself  by  inoculating  with  its  poison 
of  lies  and  hatred  England  and  the  United  States.  Again, 
why  does  not  Nicholas  mention  the  other  hounded  and  massa- 
cred peoples?  Why  does  not  the  God-sent  take  the  courage 
to  tell  us  the  unsuspected  dangers  of  our  Armenians,  Lithuan- 
ians and  Poles?  All  three  races  form  numerous  and  valuable 
elements  of  our  people,  and  the  Poles  from  Russia  are  even 
more  numerous  in  America  than  the  Russian  Jews.  How 
does  it  come  that  they  have  received  from  the  Czar  the  same 
treatment  as  the  Jews  and  raise  the  same  complaint  against  him  ? 
Why  does  not  the  Czar  tell  us  that  his  officials  are  every  whit 
as  bitter  against  the  Poles  and  Armenians  wherever  they  are 
found  in  Russia,  as  against  the  Jews?  Because  Nicholas  knows 
that  to  give  the  whole  of  his  lying  defences  in  a  single  statement 
would  in  itself  be  sufficient  to  convict  him  of  falsehood. 

We  hear  from  the  Czar's  own  lips  that  the  Jews  are  a  separate 
"nation"  —  that  is,  foreigners  in  his  Empire.  We  know  that 
this  is  the  fixed  view  of  the  Russian  law  concerning  both  the 
Jews  and  the  rest  of  the  fifty  million  not  of  Russian  race,  but 
it  is  an  unexpected  frankness  to  have  it  so  stated  by  the  Auto- 
crat himself.  So  there  are  fifty  million  foreigners  in  Russia, 
to  be  legally  oppressed  and  on  occasion  enumerated  among 
"the  internal  enemy"!  And  these  same  people  are  also  "iso- 
lated" by  their  religion!  Not  in  civilised  countries,  but  in  Rus- 
sia we  know  that  innumerable  privileges  are  reserved  for  only 
the  orthodox.     Yes,  once  more  and  finally,  we  have  from  the 


62  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

mouth  of  the  Czar  the  secret  of  autocracy  and  the  very  founda- 
tion of  all  his  power.  Hatred,  violence,  war;  these  are  the 
savage  instincts  in  man  by  the  development  of  which  the  Czar 
hopes  to  master.     In  the  end  always  war. 

The  idea  is  very  old.  Every  absolutism  and  every  political 
slavery  has  so  far  been  based  on  war.  But  Russia's  mannner  of 
waging  war  is  new.  She  has  invented  a  system  of  universal  war 
within  her  own  borders  that  for  the  purposes  of  despotism 
excels  the  most  ingenious  contrivances  of  Macchiavellian  or 
Roman  Imperial  politics.  Russia  might  well  surpass  her 
predecessors  and  has  in  fact  done  so.  History  has  never  known 
a  power  more  absolute,  more  despotic,  than  the  Czar's,  and  the 
world  has  never  seen  an  absolutism  with  a  tithe  of  Russia's 
population,  resources,  territory,  and  organisation,  to  say  nothing 
of  the  thoroughly  modem  equipment  of  her  army  and  the 
half -modem  exploitation  of  her  wealth.  Russia's  absolutism 
is  more  than  a  success  —  it  is  danger  to  civilisation.  If  the 
Russian  system  can  survive  in  the  modem  world,  it  will  be 
copied  in  neighbouring  countries,  and  so  on  indefinitely.  It  is 
a  standing  menace  to  the  freedom  and  progress  of  humanity 
in  the  coming  age.  No  free  people  can  afford  to  view  it  with 
indifference. 

The  great  and  novel  feature  of  Russian  statesmanship  on 
which  the  Czar  stakes  his  empire  is  civil  strife.  The  Empire  is 
already  too  large  for  imperialism.  The  people  are  satisfied  with 
the  extent  of  their  country,  as  large  as  the  average  continent, 
touching  on  all  the  seas  and  embracing  nearly  every  clime.  The 
foreigner  is  too  far  away  to  hate.  Besides,  an  attack  on  one 
enemy  exposes  to  another  some  flank  of  the  unwieldy  country. 
/  Like  Great  Britain,  Russia  will  be  glad  with  the  addition  of 
I  some  few  small  pieces  of  territory  she  can  easily  get  by  treaty 
'  to  keep  what  she  already  has.  The  recent  treaty  with  Great 
Britain  showed  that  both  are  essentially  peaceful  powers. 
Russia  can  scarcely  defend  her  purely  military  form  of  govern- 
ment on  the  ground  of  danger  from  abroad.  But  since  absolut- 
ism lives  solely  by  violence  employed  against  the  people  there 
must  be  some  pretext  or  other  for  military  rule,  government 
outside  of  any  law.  Fortunately  for  the  Czar  the  fifty  million, 
non- Russian    subjects   are   not   yet    thoroughly    intermarried 


CREATING  THE  "INTERNAL  ENEMY"     63 

with  the  Russians  nor  evenly  distributed  over  the  kingdom. 
The  pretext  has  been  found.  In  the  case  of  some  races,  as 
the  Tartars  and  Armenians,  the  officials  have  been  able  to  pro- 
duce an  actual  war.  With  others,  as  with  the  Jews,  it  has  been 
necessary  to  subsidise  a  war  between  them  and  the  secret  police 
and  criminal  element.  By  these  means  the  Czar  remains 
absolute  master.  He  does  not  need  to  risk  a  foreign  war,  nor 
to  wait  for  a  favourable  occasion.  He  can  have  his  wars,  or 
what  is  equally  useful  for  his  purposes,  his  "states  of  war"  or 
abolition  of  civil  order  and  civil  government,  when  and  where 
he  wishes. 

The  Czar  in  this  statement,  then,  is  busied  with  inventing  an 
enemy.  For  without  an  enemy  there  is  no  hate,  no  violence, 
no  open  or  latent  civil  war ;  and  without  civil  war  the  Czar  would 
be  supported,  of  course,  by  just  exactly  the  number  of  people 
he  could  buy.  A  part  of  the  Russian  people,  the  officials  and 
landlords,  the  Cossacks  and  the  dregs  of  the  population,  he  has 
bought.  But  the  money  was  not  his  own,  and  without  an  unpaid 
increment  composed  of  other  elements  of  the  population,  the 
investment  is  a  bad  one.  For  not  one  of  the  elements  so  far  bought 
produces  any  noticeable  income  to  the  State.  They  are  all 
parasites,  and  a  greater  number  of  such  parasites  will  be  needed 
to  keep  the  people  down  every  day  the  people  advance  in 
wealth-producing  power.  Every  step  forward  in  the  wealth- 
producing  power  of  the  nation,  which  is  the  objective  of  the 
people  who  lend  the  money  in  Germany  or  France,  is  also  a  step 
forward  in  the  intelligence,  organisation,  unity,  and  revolt  of 
the  people  of  the  Empire. 

The  Czar's  appeal  to  hatred  is  not  a  sudden  inspiration  of 
malice  or  an  instinctive  revenge.  It  is  a  deep  expression  of 
what  has  constituted  the  life  principle  of  the  Czarism  since  the 
dawn  of  history. 

The  Czar's  civil  war  is  stirred  up  by  a  campaign  of  lies  of  every 
kind,  is  conducted  publicly  by  Government  officials  and  by 
means  of  direct  attacks  on  the  property  and  liberties  of  the  non- 
Russian  subject  races,  the  Russian  intellectuals  and  peasants  — 
these  officials  acting  either  through  specific  laws  requiring  such 
persecution,  or  under  the  arbitrary  power  placed  in  their  hands, 
or  under  administrative  law,  or  under  martial  law,  or,  since  there 


64  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

is  never  any  responsibility  to  the  people  in  any  case,  even  directly 
counter  to  all  these  so-called  laws. 

The  aims  and  hopes  of  the  official  persecution  are  best  shown 
by  the  official  propaganda.  Witness  the  proclamation  printed 
on  the  official  press  of  the  prefect  of  St.  Petersburg,  authorised 
by  the  censor,  cynically  defended  later  in  an  official  investigation 
by  the  prefect  on  the  sole  ground  of  this  authorisation,  and 
defended  by  the  censor  himself  because  its  printing  had  been 
ordered  by  "a  man  who  had  not  been  without  value"  — sup- 
posedly to  the  reactionary  cause. 

"Do  you  know,  brothers,  workingmen,  and  peasants,  who  is 
the  principal  author  of  all  our  ills  ?  Do  you  know  that  the  Jews 
of  Russia,  America,  Germany,  and  England  have  concluded 
an  alliance  and  decided  completely  to  destroy  the  Russian 
Empire?"  asks  this  shameless  document.  In  West  Russia 
just  such  proclamations  are  launched  against  the  Poles,  in 
the  Caucasus  against  the  Armenians,  in  the  Baltic  Provinces 
against  the  Letts,  in  the  country  against  the  workingmen,  in 
the  city  against  the  students,  the  educated  classes  or  "intellec- 
tuals" and  the  Jews. 

"When  these  betrayers  of  Christ  present  themselves,"  con- 
tinues the  proclamation,  "slash  them  to  pieces,  kill  them,  so 
as  to  take  away  from  them  all  wish  to  come."  The  document 
is  vicious,  ignorant  and  at  once  both  calculating  and  naive  — 
it  breathes  the  very  soul  of  the  statesmanship  of  Nicholas,  the 
ministers  and  the  court.  "The  order  has  been  given,"  it  says 
to  the  people,  "to  elect  men  who  will  represent  you  before  the 
Czar  (referring  to  the  Duma).  Remember  that  your  natural 
defenders  are  the  landlords,  manufacturers,  and  orthodox 
merchants."  How  ignorant  these  governmental  hopes  in 
Russian  peasants  and  workingmen!  Except  where  under 
coercion,  they  did  not  elect  a  single  landlord.  The  valuable 
document  then  makes  a  complete  exposition  of  the  court's 
favourite  measures  for  "settling"  the  Jewish  question.  They 
are  similar  to  those  that  have  been  practised  for  twenty-five 
years  by  the  Czar  and  his  "sainted  father,"  Alexander  III.,  whom 
he  claims  as  pattern.  This  document  says  that  the  Jews,  who 
kept  out  of  half  the  towns,  are  to  be  expelled  not  only  from  all 
the  cities  of  European  and  Asiatic  Russia,  but  also  from  ten 


A  TYPE    OF  THE   TERRORISTS   WHO    ARE   CREATED    BY  :        :     \ 

Sasonov,  who  in  1904   killed  von  Plehve — the  most  popular  terrorist  act  ever 
committed  in  Russia 


"VERSITY 


MARIE    SPIRIDOXOVA 

The  most  famous  woman  terrorist  of  recent  years.     She  killed  the  brutal  com- 
mander of  a  "pacification"  expedition 


CREATING  THE  "INTERNAL  ENEMY"     65 

small  towns  of  South  Russia  where  they  are  now  allowed  to 
reside.  Where  permitted  to  live,  they  are  not  to  be  allowed 
to  trade  in  grain,  meat  or  wood,  or  to  open  banking  or  commer- 
cial houses  or  "similar  establishments,"  or  to  own  any  real 
estate.  All  special  Jewish  schools  are  to  be  closed  and  the  Jews 
are  to  be  deprived  of  the  right  of  entrance  to  all  the  Russian 
higher,  secondary  and  technical  schools.  The  author-officials 
recognise  that  it  will  take  a  complete  sang-froid  to  execute  these 
measures,  but  "the  cause  is  holy,"  nothing  less  than  "the 
lasting  rescue  of  the  people  from  the  internal  enemy." 

The  "holy  cause"  is  at  the  present  time  especially  "holy," 
not  so  much  for  the  plunder  the  Czar's  officials  are  used  to 
extracting  from  the  Jews  and  other  "internal  enemies,"  as  for 
the  hope  that  the  people  can  be  corrupted  by  a  promise  of  a 
share  in  this  plunder  to  turn  their  wrath  away  from  the  Govern- 
ment to  the  Jews.  For  this  purpose  all  the  legislation  has  been 
devilishly  contrived  from  the  outset.  Whenever  the  country 
has  become  very  quiet,  of  course  the  officials  keep  all  the  plunder 
for  themselves;  in  other  words,  they  allow  the  Jews  to  violate 
the  law,  or  if  paid  enough  they  even  moderate  its  provisions 
for  a  time.  When  revolutionary  trouble  begins  again,  the 
persecution  takes  the  form  of  legislation  and  enforcement  of  the 
law,  instead  of  secret  blackmail.  The  purpose  of  the  laws  is  not 
mere  punishment  or  the  satisfaction  of  an  existing  hatred,  but 
an  appeal  to  the  greed  and  selfishness  of  all  who  compete  in  any 
sphere  with  the  Jews  and  can  draw  a  profit  from  the  handicap 
set  by  the  Government  on  their  rivals  in  the  race.  There  is 
no  race  hatred,  but  there  is  selfish  and  even  criminal  greed  —  in 
certain  classes. 

All  during  the  last  century  the  laws  have  been  thus  reversed 
according  to  the  Government's  varying  need,  either  to  let  the 
Jew  prosper  and  to  plunder  his  wealth,  or  to  ruin  him  to  please 
his  competitors  and  win  an  enthusiastic  and  aggressive  support 
among  certain  elements  of  the  population  in  behalf  of  the  whole 
system  of  oppression  that  is  called  by  the  name  of  government. 
The  law  forbidding  Jews  to  sell  liquor  was  twice  repealed  and 
twice  passed  again;  that  forbidding  them  to  deal  in  land  was 
repealed,  then  passed  again,  then  twice  relaxed  in  practise, 
then  strengthened  until  now  it  is  absolute.     The  right  to  live 


66  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

in  villages  was  passed,  repealed,  passed  again,  and  again  strength- 
ened. It  was  justified  on  what  Prince  Urussov  brands  as  the 
pure  hypocrisy  of  separating  the  Jews  in  order  to  protect  them 
from  the  Christians! 

The  Jews,  shut  out  of  agriculture  and  many  other  occupations 
by  law,  are  forced  into  petty  trade  and  handwork.  Here  the 
wages  and  profit  become  so  low  from  over-competition  that 
other  nationalities  shun  these  occupations,  until  finally  nearly 
all  little  shopkeepers  and  artisans  are  Jews.  Then  arises  the 
cry  for  further  persecution,  in  hope  that  it  may  drive  the  Jews 
from  these  occupations  also.  The  cry  arises,  of  course,  not  from 
the  producers  of  raw  material,  since  it  is  good  to  have  many 
buyers,  nor  from  the  purchasers,  who  also  profit  from  the 
competition,  but  from  those  non- Jewish  little  traders  and  arti- 
zans  who  remain.  It  is  to  these  poor  starving  wretches  that 
the  Government  appeals  with  its  campaign  of  murderous 
plimder.  Having  artificially  produced  this  desperate  misery, 
the  Czar  and  his  servants  turn  part  of  these  wretches  against 
the  others  with  a  promise  of  their  business  when  they  are 
destroyed. 

The  relatively  small  but  desperately  needy  class  of  Russian 
small  shopkeepers  has  in  many  places  succumbed  to  the  poison, 
and  wherever  the  Jews  are  numerous  allows  the  Government  to 
work  them  up  periodically  into  a  pitch  of  hatred,  hardly  murderous, 
however,  since  many  Jews  are  their  associates  and  friends. 
It  is  rather  their  wilder  sons  that  furnish  new  recruits  to  the 
criminal  and  professional  "patriotic"  organisations.  But  the 
small  merchants  do  enroll  themselves,  subscribe  to  the  organi- 
sation and  read  its  papers,  and  it  is  undoubtedly  to  the  selfish 
interest  of  the  small  trader  in  the  ruin  of  Jews  that  the  Govern- 
ment makes  its  most  direct  appeal. 

I  talked  with  Tichamirov,  the  editor  of  the  notorious  Moscow 
organ  of  the  League  of  Russian  Men,  who  made  clear  to  me  at 
once  the  purely  lower  middle  class  basis  of  the  league.  He  is 
close  to  the  people,  as  he  was  a  leader  of  the  revolutionary  party 
in  the  former  reign.  While  an  exile  abroad  he  completely 
reversed  his  politics,  and  has  written  a  book  on  the  Czars  which 
is  said  to  be  the  most  able  defence  of  autocracy  extant.  He 
did  not  hesitate  for  a  moment  to  acknowledge  that  anti-semit- 


CREATING  THE  "INTERNAL  ENEMY"     67 

ism  was  the  basis  of  the  ultra-reactionary  party  and  the  hope 
of  the  Czarism.  This  anti-semitism  he  considers  to  be  in  its 
essence  an  economic  movement,  and  it  is  by  conservative  econ- 
omic reform,  not  political,  that  he  hopes  to  preserve  the  domina- 
tion in  Russia  of  the  autocracy,  the  Orthodox  Church  and  the 
Russian  nationality. 

Politically,  like  all  the  leaders  that  stand  with  the  Czar, 
Tichamirov  favours  inertia.  All  accept  what  the  Czar  has  given 
without  asking  what  it  is,  and  all  say  that  what  the  Czar  has 
given,  Duma  or  what  not,  the  Czar  can  take  away.  Either  they 
do  not  ask  whether  Russia  has  a  constitution,  or  else  they  say 
definitely  with  Tichamirov  that  a  pure  autocracy  still  prevails. 
They  accept  the  Duma,  but  they  do  not  object  to  any  of  the 
innumerable  limitations  under  which  it  has  proven  utterly 
powerless  whenever  opposed  by  the  ministers  of  the  Czar. 
The  League  of  Russian  Men  and  all  extreme  reactionaries  are, 
nevertheless,  in  a  certain  peculiar  sense  democrats.  They 
believe  in  the  possibility  of  a  mystical  direct  union  of  "the 
true  Russian  people"  under  their  leadership  with  the 
Czar,  and  they  profess  to  believe  that  no  disagreement  in 
this  case  is  possible  and  that  so  autocracy  and  democracy 
can  become  one. 

This  peculiar  union  and  harmony  it  is  hoped  to  attain  by 
purely  economic  reforms.  The  Czar  is  to  favour  those  classes 
that  are  most  loyal  to  him  and  his  policies,  and  these  classes 
are  to  grow  and  flourish  until  the  whole  people  become  the 
loving  children  of  the  "Little  Father,"  the  Czar.  Naturally 
one  must  begin,  not  with  the  peasants,  but  with  the  smalf 
shopkeepers  and  the  small  landowners.  The  league  has- 
always  bought  for  itself  a  fighting  organisation  of  the  very^ 
lowest  social  classes,  but  nowhere  has  is  obtained  any  real  foot- 
hold among  the  mass  of  the  people,  the  peasants  and  workingmen. 
These  classes  are  neither  loyal  to  the  Czar  nor  do  they  want 
small  doles  in  land,  but  a  sovereign  people's  Duma,  expropriation 
of  the  landlords,  and  a  social  guarantee  against  accumulation 
of  the  land  in  the  future  in  private  hands.  The  league  has 
definitely  recognised  that  the  workingmen  and  peasants,  at 
least  for  the  moment,  have  strayed  off  the  true  path.  Ticha- 
mirov even  confessed  that  he  did  not  wish  to  see  an  extension 


68  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

of  peasant  communal  ownership,  nor  even  of  small  farms,  but 
only  of  those  with  from  132  to  266  acres. 

Outside  of  the  Government  and  nobility  these  small  landlords 
and  shopkeepers  are  almost  the  sole  class  from  which  the  league 
gets  the  rank  and  file  of  its  members,  and  that  they  succeed 
here  is  due  solely  to  the  diabolical  machinations  of  the  Govern- 
ment. An  overwhelming  majority,  however,  even  of  the  small 
landowners  belong  to  other  less  reactionary  or  even  to  merely 
conservative  groups;  while  the  larger  landlords  have  a  party 
of  their  own,  the  moderate  reactionaries.  The  majority  of  the 
small  landowners  are  probably  conservative  or  reactionary, 
but  certainly  not  very  extreme  since  scarcely  one  out  of  ten 
took  the  trouble  to  vote.  The  small  shopkeepers,  on  the  other 
hand,  took  a  lively  interest.  With  the  aid  of  the  lower  officials, 
everywhere  openly  or  secretly  connected  with  the  organisation, 
and  of  the  wholesale  disfranchisements  under  the  new  election 
law,  they  carried  many  of  the  smaller  towns.  These  small 
tradesmen,  joined  by  the  numerous  class  of  landlords  who  are 
also  officials,  or  officials  who  are  also  landlords,  and  by  the 
higher  clergy,  elected  over  one  hundred  members  or  one-fourth 
of  the  third  Duma. 

To  this  anti-semitic  party  the  peasants  have  contributed 
almost  nothing.  In  eighty-four  out  of  the  eighty-six  provinces 
(or  states)  they  have  refused  practically  to  have  anything  to  do 
with  the  organisation.  Out  of  sixteen  thousand  township  electors 
for  the  third  Duma  only  fifty-one  declared  themselves  members  of 
the  league,  and  of  these  thirty-three  came  from  the  one  govern- 
ment of  Volhynia,  leaving  several  hundred  even  in  that  govern- 
ment in  other  parties.  All  unprejudiced  observations  agree 
with  those  I  made  personally  in  a  score  of  Russian  villages. 
Among  the  peasants  there  is  almost  no  racial  prejudice  of  any 
kind.  Even  in  those  governments  into  which  the  law  has 
forced  the  Jews  in  abnormal  numbers,  there  is  scarcely  a  trace 
of  hostility.  Witness  the  Duma's  report  on  Bielostock,  already 
quoted,  and  Prince  Urussov's  conversations  with  Bessarabian 
peasants.  These  peasants  did  not  understand  why  he  should 
ask  them  such  a  foolish  question  as  to  whether  they  were  hostile 
to  the  Jews,  and  simply  answered  with  other  questions:  "What 
do  you  mean?     What  kind  of  hostility?     Why  any  hostility?" 


CREATING   THE    "INTERNAL   ENEMY"  69 

I  learned  absolutely  nothing  from  the  peasants  about  anti- 
semitism,  because  they  don't  know  what  Jew-baiting  means. 
It  is  all  a  question  of  plunder.  The  purely  business  reasons 
for  the  persecution  are  baldly  stated  by  the  "patriotic  organisa- 
tions" themselves.  The  Fatherland  Union,  of  which  Count 
Bobrinsky  was  chief  organiser,  states  in  its  preamble,  "If  to 
give  the  Jews  equal  rights  should  prove  to  be  detrimental  to 
Russians,  then  no  matter  how  convincing  the  arguments  are, 
we  shall  be  energetically  opposed  to  it."  This  is  as  if  we  should 
deny  rights  of  citizenship  to  emigrants,  or  to  Americans  who 
were  not  "Sons  of  the  Revolution."  For  the  Jews  and  other 
subject  races  have  inhabited  Russia  for  hundreds  of  years. 
"Russia  is  first  of  all  for  the  Russians,"  says  the  declaration, 
apparently  meaning  those  whose  ancestors  have  been  Russian 
for  a  thousand  years;  and  further,  "the  more  elements  there 
are  of  foreign  origin  in  the  Russian  Empire  the  stronger  and 
more  forcible  must  the  real  Russian  nationality  be  represented 
in  it."  What  if  Americans  were  to  say,  the  more  foreigners 
we  have  the  more  we  must  restrict  their  privileges  and  those 
of  their  children  to  the  last  generation? 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   DANGER    OP    PROGRESS 

THE  organisations  that  defend  the  autocracy  are  without 
exception  the  same  that  call  for  the  persecution  of  the 
subject  races  and  oppose  the  giving  either  of  land  or  of  civil 
or  political  rights  to  the  people. 

The  Union  of  the  Fatherland,  the  League  of  Russian  Men, 
the  Russian  Assembly  and  the  other  ** patriotic"  organisations, 
are  "absolutely  opposed  to  any  lessening  of  the  Czar's  power." 
One  hundred  and  forty-six  of  their  members  in  the  third  Duma 
recognise  Nicholas  as  an  absolutely  unlimited  autocrat.  Why 
this  self-renunciation,  self-annihilation  indeed?  Because  the 
leagues  are  sure  of  this  and  all  future  Czars.  They  know 
that  the  Czar  created  a  Duma  of  officials  and  landlords.  They 
know  that  he  has  restricted  the  rights  of  the  small  merchants* 
Jewish  rivals  to  seats  on  exchanges  or  on  merchants',  artizans' 
and  citizens'  commissions,  and  they  hope  that  he  will  exclude 
them  altogether  from  these  bodies.  They  know  that  even 
the  Centre  of  the  Duma,  composed  partly  of  mere  conservatives 
rather  than  reactionaries,  has  abandoned  the  Jews.  They  have 
nothing  to  gain,  and  everything  to  lose  then,  by  the  most 
elementary  political  freedom,  and  so  they  believe  in  the  unlimited 
autocracy  of  the  Czar. 

We  are  beginning  to  penetrate  into  the  citadel  of  reaction. 
To  the  obvious  fact  that  the  Czar  governs  by  the  mere  physical 
power  of  the  army  and  police,  we  have  added  the  less  obvious 
fact  that  he  governs  by  creating  real  or  fictitious  civil  wars; 
to  the  evident  hostility  of  absolutism  to  democracy,  we  have 
added  its  hostility  even  to  the  most  elementary  or  conservative 
forms  of  political  or  legal  order.  The  Czarism  is  opposed  to  all 
political  rights  and  to  any  constitutional  system.  It  is  the 
complete  antithesis  not  only  of  individual  freedom,  but  even 
of  law  and  order. 

70 


THE    DANGER   OF    PROGRESS  71 

Now  we  can  get  a  still  deeper  insight.  In  order  to  protect 
the  Czarism  from  the  demand  of  the  people  for  justice,  order 
and  law,  the  Government  and  reactionaries  are  compelled  to 
attack  every  line  of  progress.  The  spread  of  intelligence  through 
the  press,  schools,  and  universities  must  be  hindered,  the  coming 
into  Russia  of  foreign  culture  must  be  prevented,  religious 
evolution  must  at  least  be  held  where  it  is,  and  modem  capital- 
ism and  business  methods  must  be  admitted  with  every  con- 
ceivable restriction  and  foresight.  The  Russian  bureaucrats 
and  leading  reactionaries  are  not  a  wonderfully  endowed  race, 
but  they  are  no  savages.  They  have  as  a  rule  half  a  higher 
education.  They  have  read  and  travelled  over  Europe.  They 
are  not  opposed  to  higher  education,  modem  business,  European 
culture,  religious  progress,  and  constitutional  government, 
because  they  dislike  these  things  in  themselves,  but  because 
these  things  endanger  their  private  positions  and  the  whole 
system  from  which  they  draw  their  support.  There  are  a  few 
sentimental  writers  who  work  themselves  up  into  a  genuine 
hatred  of  progress.  The  bureaucrats  give  these  writings  their 
approval,  pass  them  on  to  the  people,  and  even  paraphrase 
them  in  the  laws.  But  of  course  they  would  not  express  any 
such  views  personally,  as  for  example  when  in  conversation 
with  intelligent  foreigners  or  their  bosom  friends.  We  must 
do  justice  to  their  intelligence.  They  are  not  fools.  The  lie  by 
which  they  live  and  degrade  themselves  and  the  whole  nation 
they  command,  is  conscious  and  deliberate. 

All  the  Government's  campaigns  against  progress  are  con- 
ducted on  the  same  principles  as  the  attack  on  the  Jewish 
tradesmen  already  outlined.  The  Government  always  appeals 
to  the  baser  instincts  of  some  element  of  the  population  that 
may  draw  a  profit  from  the  ruin  of  another,  and  it  always 
manages  to  connect  its  enemies  in  some  way  or  other  with  the 
Jews.  The  onslaught  on  the  freedom  of  the  press,  on  the 
schools  and  universities  is,  for  instance,  often  enough  defended 
on  the  direct  ground  that  all  these  institutions  are  opposed 
to  the  old  ideas  of  autocracy.  But  when  the  courage  for  such 
honesty  is  lacking,  the  attack  is  aimed  first  at  the  Jews.  The 
teachers,  the  students,  the  press,  it  is  said,  are  under  Jewish 
influence.     It  is  for  this  reason,  then,  that  the  already  miserable 


72  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

schools  must  be  deprived  often  of  half  their  teachers,  the  uni- 
versities once  more  closed,  and  the  last  shred  of  so-called  jour- 
nalistic freedom,  first  created  two  years  ago  and  already  grad- 
ually attenuated  to  almost  nothing,  finally  taken  away. 

Anti-semitism  is  the  touchstone  of  the  reaction.  It  was  for 
some  time  a  question  whether  the  party  which  controls  the  third 
Duma,  the  conservative  Octobrists,  would  on  the  whole  prove 
moderately  progressive  or  moderately  reactionary.  The  doubt 
was  short-lived.  They  have  made  a  political  agreement  with 
the  outright  reactionaries  by  which  they  have  abandoned  the 
Jews.  They  will  not  even  ask  for  Jewish  equality  before  the 
law.  This  means,  and  is  actually  accompanied  by,  an  abandon- 
ment of  all  the  other  subject  races  and  oppressed  classes  of  the 
Empire.  In  fact  my  talk  with  the  leader,  Gutchkov,  made  it 
unmistakably  clear  that  the  Octobrists  will  insist  on  keeping 
control  of  the  Duma  at  every  cost  and  that  for  this  purpose 
they  will  work,  as  they  must,  almost  wholly  with  the  landlords 
and  bureaucrats  who  constitute  a  large  majority  of  the  assembly. 
Gutchkov  is  satisfied  especially  with  the  landlords  and  says 
that  at  the  bottom  they  are  progressive  men.  I  shall  show 
later  how  this  is  the  reverse  of  the  truth.  It  is  enough  to  say 
here  that  this  alliance  with  the  reactionary  landlords  is  in  itself 
enough  to  alienate  from  the  Duma  leader  every  other  important 
element  of  the  population. 

Since  the  third  Duma  has  decided  to  take  up  a  position  with 
the  Government  against  the  Jews  and  other  subject  races,  it 
has  the  same  pretext  as  the  Government  for  every  reactionary 
measure.  It  will  not  now  be  necessary  to  make  a  direct  attack 
on  progress,  and  the  so-called  moderates  can  even  continue  the 
polite  and  harmless  verbal  criticism  on  the  bureaucracy  and 
the  court  without  coming  to  any  serious  disagreement  with 
either.  The  campaign  against  progress  in  the  form  of  the 
spread  of  intelligence,  has  already  been  typically  instituted  by 
Gutchkov 's  own  organ  in  Moscow,  the  object  being  first  of  all 
narrowly  selfish  —  that  is,  to  destroy  this  newspaper's  rivals  — • 
and  only  incidentally  to  aid  the  Government. 

"The  very  fact  alone,"  says  this  oracle  of  the  third  Duma, 
"that  nine-tenths  of  our  press  is  in  the  hands  of  the  Jews  is  a 
disgrace.     .     .     .     We  must  see  to  it  that  Russians  who  know 


THE   DANGER   OF    PROGRESS  73 

that  a  certain  paper  is  Jewish  must  not  only  not  read  it,  but 
not  even  take  it  in  their  hands."  This  "moderate"  party 
organ  further  suggests  Duma  legislation  against  the  freedom 
of  press,  and  finally  adds  a  sentence  that  discloses  the  truth, 
which  is  that  it  is  not  really  the  Jews  but  the  opposition  in 
general  that  troubles  it.  For  it  is  "not  only  the  Jewish  press 
but  the  present  oppositional  press,  preponderantly  Jewish"  that 
is  "in  its  spirit  rotten  and  foreign.''  We  also  see  here,  as  we 
shall  see  again  and  again,  that  what  is  foreign  is  scarcely  to  be 
distinguished  from  what  is  rotten  by  the  truly  reactionary  mind. 

How  does  this  moderate  onslaught  differ  from  that  made  a 
year  before  by  Trepov,  speaking  almost  in  the  name  of  the 
Czar?  "  Don't  you  see,"  Trepov  said  to  an  English  interviewer, 
"that  a  part  of  the  newspapers  of  St.  Petersburg  are  owned  by 
the  Jews  and  that  the  majority  of  their  editors  are  Jews? 
Don't  you  see  to  what  point  the  Jews  are  represented  in  the 
Duma?  Say  what  you  like,  this  revolutionary  movement  is 
principally  the  work  of  the  Jews."  But  the  Jewish  writers 
in  the  capital  are  scarcely  as  numerous  proportionately  as  the 
Jewish  readers  of  the  press,  there  are  as  many  anti-semitic  as 
Jewish  newspaper  proprietors,  and  there  were  only  twelve 
Jewish  members  of  that  Duma  instead  of  the  twenty  to  which 
their  numbers  in  the  country  entitled  them.  Even  this  small 
representation  was,  of  course,  a  disappointment  to  a  Government 
that  hoped  there  would  be  none  in  its  assembly,  but  the  great 
disillusion  was  that  there  were  not  half  a  dozen  anti-semites. 
In  spite  of  all  the  outrages  of  the  officials  in  the  elections,  and 
the  innumerable  inequalities  of  the  election  law  in  favour  of  the 
Jew-baiters,  there  were  not  six  men  in  five  hundred  that  voted 
against  the  full  equality  of  the  Jews. 

The  hostility  to  Jewish  and  oppositional  freedom  of  opinion 
and  enlightenment,  leads  directly  to  attacks  on  enlightenment 
itself.  In  a  local  government  board  in  Bessarabia  recently 
the  question  arose  whether  in  the  country  town  of  Akkerman 
the  library  for  teachers  should  be  continued.  No  doubt  it 
was  the  only  library  there.  The  notorious  reactionist 
Pureschewitch,  who  happened  to  be  a  member  of  the  board, 
spoke  heatedly  and  for  hours  against  the  library. 

"What  do  you  teachers  need  books  for?"  he  cried.     "Either 


74  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

you  have  learned  enough  already  and  you  don't  need  to  learn 
more,  or  you  have  learned  nothing.  In  either  case  you  don't 
need  books. 

"No  more  books!  Through  your  books,  through  your 
teachers,  sedition  is  being  carried  amongst  the  people.  For 
the  rooting  out  of  this  sedition,  not  the  Manifesto  of  October 
17th,  but  ptmishment  expeditions  are  what  we  need." 

In  the  meanwhile  the  Czar's  Government  is  careful  not 
to  allow  the  chief  prey  and  scapegoat  by  any  possibility  to 
go  free.  The  Jews  are  not  permitted  in  any  of  the  thousand 
activities  of  life  to  fuse  themselves  with  the  rest  of  the 
population.  The  Jews,  artificially  held  separate  from  the 
rest  of  the  nation  in  the  ways  I  have  indicated,  are  also  forcibly 
held  separate  in  religion,  in  education,  and  in  every  other  pos- 
sible way.  The  most  conservative  rabbis  only  are  permitted  to 
perform  their  functions,  and  intellectually  inclined  Jews  are 
by  tens  of  thousands  forcibly  prevented  from  obtaining  such 
an  education  as  would  allow  them  to  become  one  with  the 
educated  class.  We  have  seen  that  the  reactionaries  demand 
that  all  higher  education  be  closed  to  the  Jews.  Already  many 
such  institutions  as  the  St.  Petersburg  Normal,  Dramatic, 
Electrical  Engineering  and  Railway  Engineering  schools, 
the  Moscow  Agricultural  and  Medical  schools  are  completely 
closed  against  them,  while  in  all  other  higher  institutions, 
though  from  a  fourth  to  a  half  of  the  applicants  for  admission 
are  Jews,  they  are  allowed  to  form  only  from  2  to  10  per  cent, 
of  those  in  attendance.  So  perhaps  not  one  young  Jew  out 
of  ten  striving  for  a  higher  education  is  permitted  to  attain  one. 
In  primary  education  the  conditions  are  still  worse,  for  here 
only  the  smallest  nimiber  of  Russian-teaching  schools  are 
provided  by  the  State,  while  Jews  are  forbidden  to  teach  children 
the  Russian  language.  As  a  consequence,  in  one  of  the  provinces 
where  an  investigation  was  held  (Odessa),  it  was  found  that 
only  II  per  cent,  of  the  Jews  could  read  and  write  the 
Russian  language.  The  evident  intention  of  the  Government 
is  to  keep  them  separate  for  easier  persecution. 

In  the  schools,  as  elsewhere,  the  plan  has  some  success. 
Of  course  there  are  far  from  enough  schools  for  the  population 
anyway.     Under  these  circumstances  only  good  students  should 


THE    DANGER   OF  PROGRESS  75 

be  admitted,  and  a  large  proportion  of  those  passing  the  best 

j     examinations  are  Jews.     But  it  is  evident  that  for  every  good 

^)*^ Jewish  student  excluded  some  inferior  Russian  can  find  a  place. 

j     From  this  exclusion  of  Jewish  students  there  results  a  double 

I     gain  for  the  Czarism.     The  standard  of  dangerous  intelligence 

^    is  lowered  and  "  Russianised,"  and  at  the  same  time  the  inferior 

Russian  students  are  corrupted.     Boys  whose  dulness  already 

inclined  them  to  reaction  are  often  made  "patriots"  once  for 

all  by  the  selfish  interest  to  keep  a  place  they  have  no  right  to. 

So  there  is  a  certain  minority  of  young  reactionaries  in  the 

intermediate  schools.     But   such   students  are   not   suited   for 

higher    professional    studies.     They    become    rather    officers, 

bureaucrats,     landlords,  or    merchants.     In    the    universities 

there  is  scarcely  a  trace  either  of  reaction  or  of  hostility  to  the 

Jews.     So  strongly,  indeed,  do  the  Russian  students  stand  up 

for  the  rights  of  their  fellows  that  the  universities  must  often 

be  closed  to  make  it  possible  to  carry  out  the  persecution  of  the 

Jews,  as  has  recently  happened  at  Odessa  and  at  Kiev.     The 

Government,     moving    ostensibly     against    the    "foreigners," 

has  had  the  satisfaction  of  being  able  to  shut  up  at  the  same  time 

some  of  the  most  important  centres  for  the  spread  of  general 

intelligence. 

By  the  revival  of  religious  persecution  the  Government  hopes 
to  enrage  against  the  non-orthodox  Russian  sects,  against 
Catholics,  Protestants,  Mohammedans,  and  Jews,  all  the 
narrowly  fanatical  and  blindly  superstitious  elements  of  the 
people.  But  unfortunately  for  the  Czarism,  such  elements 
are  as  rare  in  Russia  as  in  any  country  in  the  world.  This 
may  seem  strange,  but  the  liberal  Milyoukov,  the  reactionary 
Tichamirov,  and  the  best  observers  of  all  schools  are  agreed  that 
it  is  so.  Perhaps  the  most  obvious  reason  for  no  growth  of 
deep-rooted  traditions  in  Russia  is  the  absence  of  sharply 
defined  national  boundaries,  at  least  in  the  older  and  European 
section.  In  complete  contrast  with  the  rest  of  Europe  there 
were  in  Russia  no  naturally  fixed  populations,  little  hereditary 
permanence  of  residence,  little  chance  for  narrow  and  local 
traditions  to  be  created.  Through  the  vast  empire  were  always 
wandering  and  intermarrying  families  and  tribes  of  Finns, 
Tartars,  several  very  different  races  of  Slavs,  and  even  some 


76  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

entirely  foreign  elements.  There  was  no  more  possibility  of 
deep-rooted  prejudice  than  in  the  modern  United  States. 
Another  ever-present  reason  for  no  traditions,  denied  of  course 
by  Tichamirov,  is  the  very  existence  of  the  autocracy,  at  first 
perhaps  a  military  necessity  but  later  a  sheer  burden  on  every 
useful  class.  As  each  nascent  national  tradition  had  to  have 
the  official  stamp  of  the  hated  Czarism,  the  people  rejected  it 
at  the  outset,  and  as  far  as  possible  decided  their  private  affairs 
according  to  their  actual  conditions  and  without  regard  to  the 
official  traditions  of  the  Church  or  State. 

Neither  Orthodoxy  nor  Autocracy  are  national  traditions 
among  the  people.  The  only  places  where  the  official  doctrines 
have  obtained  a  certain  hold  on  the  people,  are  where  Russia 
has  defended  the  population  in  a  recent  generation  against  some 
foreign  foe.  The  people  of  Volhynia,  for  instance,  where  the 
league  obtained  a  few  votes  even  among  the  peasants,  were 
oppressed  a  few  generations  ago  by  the  Poles.  Then  Russia, 
even  with  its  Czar,  was  the  Volhynian  peasants'  only  hope,  just 
as  later  the  Orthodox  Russian  priests  have  been  the  chief 
means  of  reawakening  among  them  the  old  Russian  language 
and  culture  almost  extirpated  during  the  Polish  dominion. 
Of  course  a  result  of  this  dependence  on  the  priests  is  that 
Volhynia  is  one  of  the  most  ignorant  provinces  of  the  empire, 
and  this  ignorance  again  aids  the  reactionary  movement.  The 
condition  is  similar  in  Bessarabia,  which  was  won  finally  from 
Turkey  only  a  few  generations  back.  There,  where  the  people 
are  not  Russians,  but  Latin  descendants  of  the  ancient  colonies 
of  Rome,  was  the  first  great  stronghold  of  Krushevan's  League 
of  Pure  Russian  Men,  and  there  also  was  the  first  great 
massacre  of  recent  years,  Kishinev. 

It  was  in  Volhynia  that  the  wild  monk,  Iliodor,  preached 
recently  to  enormous  assemblies  a  literal  religious  crusade 
against  the  internal  enemies  of  the  Czar;  and  it  was  in  the 
neighbouring  provinces  of  Eaev  that  the  following  appeal,  among 
many  others,  was  launched  in  October,  1905,  to  be  circulated 
in  Volhynia  and  other  near-by  provinces: 

In  the  name  of  the  Father,  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  the  great 
anchorite  of  the  Lavra  in  Kiev  has  ordered  the  people  to  be  informed 
that  Saint  Vladimir  who  first  christened  the  Russian  people  [Vladimir 


THE   DANGER  OF   PROGRESS  77 

was  in  reality  a  barbarian  Czar]  has  risen  out  of  the  bowels  of  the  earth, 
waked  up  the  anchorite  and  wept  with  him  about  the  Fatheriand,  brought 
to  shame  by  the  Poles  and  the  Jews. 

O  God,  where  is  the  courage  of  Russia  that  once  hurled  back  the 
foreign  hordes?  Shame  and  dishonour  to  the  descendants  of  the  holy 
Vladimir  who  tremble  before  a  handful  of  cowardly  Jews  and  street 
urchins  they  have  employed.  All  of  us  to  whom  the  name  of  Russia 
is  still  dear  must  know  that  the  Jews  and  the  Poles  are  thirsting  for  our 
blood,  that  they  are  trying  to  set  us  against  one  another  so  as  to  reach 
the  throne  over  our  dead  bodies  and  overthrow  the  Czar. 

Gather,  all  of  you,  in  the  churches,  and  take  counsel  there  as  to  how 
the  Fatherland  is  to  be  defended  against  the  Poles  and  the  Jews. 

Do  not  kill  the  Poles  and  the  Jews,  but  give  the  students  who  are  sent 
by  them  the  sound  thrashing  they  deserve. 

Each  person  who  receives  this  letter  must  make  at  least  three  copies 
and  send  them  to  other  villages  and  towns. 

He  who  has  not  fulfilled  this  order  in  six  days  will  undergo  serious 
sickness  and  evil,  but  whoever  spreads  more  than  three  copies  of  this 
letter  will  be  granted  recovery  from  incurable  diseases  and  will  prosper 
in  all  things.  In  St.  Sophia  Cathedral  and  the  cloister  of  St.  Michael 
many  will  assemble,  and  when  they  go  out  they  will  call  out  to  the  people 
that  it  shall  gather  itself  together  against  the  Jews  and  Poles. 

The  black  clergy  did  assemble  in  several  provinces,  as  a  result 
partly  of  this  denunciation,  and  led  hired  ruffians  not  to  beat 
the  students  but  to  carry  out  the  thinly  veiled  suggestion  to  kill 
the  Jews,  as  well  as  the  Russian  students  and  workingmen  that 
stood  for  their  defence. 

Certainly  if  the  Russian  peasants  were  narrow  fanatics  these 
appeals  from  the  most  holy  places  would  have  led  to  a  monstrous 
and  wholesale  bloodshed,  instead  of  to  the  cut-and-dried 
massacres  prepared  by  the  officials  and  poHce.  As  a  matter 
of  fact  only  in  one  of  the  eighty-six  governments  did  they  fall 
on  fertile  ground.  Even  here  the  promise  of  the  league  that 
every  dues-paying  member  (the  dues  are  twenty-five  cents  a 
year)  will  get  land  from  the  Government,  is  said  to  have  had 
more  to  do  with  the  movement  than  the  limited  popularity  of 
the  priests.  It  is  chiefly  the  black  monks  and  others  getting 
an  income  directly  through  the  State's  money  spent  on  the 
Church,  that  give  real  enthusiasm  to  the  religious  part  of  the 
Government  propaganda.  They  are  most  numerous  in  holy 
Kiev,  and  a  light  on  their  political  character  is  shed  by  the 
action  taken  at  a  recent  meeting  against  the  press,  presided 


78  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

over  by  Bishop  Agapite.  As  elsewhere  in  Russia  the  press  of 
Kiev  is  gagged  and  sobered  by  innumerable  fines,  yet  it 
manages  to  make  as  progressive  and  intelligent  a  presentation 
of  the  news  as  that  of  Moscow  or  St.  Petersburg.  This  skill 
and  daring  in  saying  something  in  spite  of  the  censor  had  called 
down  the  wrath  of  these  "holy  '*  ecclesiastics,  who  resolved  that 
the  great  majority  of  modem  newspapers  furthered  ideas  that 
are  in  direct  hostility  to  religion,  the  Church,  the  Government, 
society,  and  Christianity,  and  therefore  asked  that  the  censorship 
be  made  more  severe  and  that  "a  prescribed  standard  of  reason, 
morality,  and  property"  be  required  of  all  editors.  Doubtless 
their  reverences  would  like  to  examine  the  editors  themselves 
before  they  are  allowed  to  write.  Or  perhaps  they  are  opposed 
to  newspapers  in  general,  like  Pobiedonostzev.  This  old 
adviser-in-chief  of  Nicholas,  head  of  the  Church  for  the  first 
decade  of  his  reign,  thought  that  newspapers  were  largely 
responsible  for  the  democratic  spirit  that  has  corrupted  Europe 
and  the  United  States  and  brought  them  to  the  present  low 
level  from  which  God  has  spared  the  empire  of  the  Czars. 

Where  the  Government  is  unable  to  plan  religious  hatred, 
jealousy  of  the  educated  classes,  or  the  greedy  desire  for  the 
ruin  of  a  persecuted  race,  it  makes  a  direct  call  to  sheer  ignorance, 
invents  domestic  and  foreign  enemies  plotting  against  the 
Russian  nation.  In  one  place  it  is  the  Poles  and  Jews  that 
"form  the  majority  of  the  agitators"  and  are  "far  more 
dangerous  than  our  external  enemies."  These  words  were 
used  by  a  colonel  to  his  troops,  of  course  where  the  Poles  are 
numerous.  In  a  proclamation,  endorsed  by  the  censor  and 
the  governor  at  Kiev,  the  enemies  of  Russia  are  "the  Poles 
who  cannot  resign  themselves  to  the  fact  that  the  Russians  are 
not  their  serfs;  the  Japanese  and  their  allies,  the  English  and 
Americans,  who  instituted  the  war;  and  finally  the  Israelite 
Jews."  Then  follow  citations  from  the  scriptures  recalling 
the  biblical  times  when  the  Hebrews  were  massacred,  and  an 
appeal  to  repeat  these  massacres.  Soon  after  came  the 
massacres  in  the  very  places  where  the  manifesto  had  prepared 
the  way. 

The  vicious  and  glaring  cartoons  spread  by  "patriotic" 
organisations  among  the  soldiers  in  Manchuria,  leave  no  doubt 


THE   DANGER   OF    PROGRESS  79 

that  the  Government  also  at  this  time  encouraged  the  last  degree 
of  hatred  against  England  and  the  United  States.  The 
proclamation  above  mentioned,  issued  at  the  order  of  Trepov 
even  after  the  war  was  over,  is  final  evidence  on  the  question. 
A  very  responsible  editor  of  one  of  the  semi-official  Russian 
organs,  the  Sinet,  has  even  warned  the  United  States  that 
Russia  will  not  tolerate  the  insulting  remarks  made  in  American 
papers  about  the  Czar.  He  calls  for  diplomatic  action,  and 
suggests  as  the  explanation  not  that  all  truly  democratic 
newspapers  must  necessarily  oppose  despotism,  but  that  the 
American  press  is  also  owned  by  Jews. 


CHAPTER   VII 
"my  chief  support" 

THERE  is  no  end  to  the  lie  system  by  which  this  powerful 
Government  prepares  the  persecution  of  its  miserable  sub- 
jects. Special  lies  are  needed  for  the  army,  and  other  special  lies 
for  the  lower  servants  of  the  Government.  It  is  said  the  Jews  do 
not  make  good  and  willing  soldiers.  There  is  evidence  to  show 
that  before  the  present  revolutionary  movement  of  all  the  people 
began,  the  Jews  on  the  whole  made  as  good  soldiers  as  any. 
Now,  of  course,  special  persecutions  in  the  army  have  had  their 
results.  Jews  are  first  given  the  worst  of  the  recruiting,  assigned 
to  the  worst  regiments,  denied  all  chances  to  rise  from  the 
ranks,  refused  any  respect  for  their  religious  observances,  their 
race  is  insulted  in  the  addresses  of  the  officers  in  which  the 
soldiers  are  told  to  prepare  to  crush  the  Jews  —  and  then  they 
are  accused  of  not  liking  the  service.  An  officer  ordered  his 
soldiers  to  spit  in  a  Jewish  comrade's  face.  When  some  obeyed 
and  finally  the  Jew  struck  one  of  them»  he  was  courts-martialed 
for  the  act. 

The  Government  and  reactionaries  endeavour  to  get  the 
lower  officials  to  hate  the  Jews  on  another  count  —  that  is,  for 
systematically  undermining  the  laws.  Here,  in  a  word,  is  the 
legal  situation.  In  spite  of  civil  and  poHtical  disabiUties  and 
exclusion  from  State  and  charitable  aid  and  State  education, 
the  Jews  pay  the  same  taxes  as  the  rest  of  the  people.  But  this 
is  not  all.  Special  taxes  are  raised  on  Jewish  "kosher"  meat, 
and  even  on  the  candles  of  the  synagogue.  These  special  taxes 
are  supposed  to  provide  for  the  institutions  the  Jews  are  denied. 
But  no  account  is  rendered  by  the  Government  for  the  miUions 
of  rubles  raised,  and  the  money  is  often  spent,  according  to 
former  Governor  Urussov,  for  pavement  of  streets,  for  the 
maintenance  of  general  institutions  and  of  the  police,  for  the 
notorious  Russian  Red  Cross,  and  even  for  higher  schools  in 

80 


KRUSHEVAN 

Professional  Jew-baiter,  preparer  of  massacres,  and  a  leader  of  the  extreme 
reactionary  party 


"MY   CHIEF   SUPPORT"  Si 

which  Jews  are  not  allowed.  Thus  the  Jews  are  taxed  twice  over 
for  institutions  in  which  they  have  no  share.  Is  it  not  inevitable 
that  they  should  try  to  get  around  such  laws?  Yet  this  very 
fact  is  often  made  as  pretext  for  the  enactment  of  further 
restrictive  laws. 

Two  classes  the  Government  has  long  ago  secured  for  its  civil 
war  programme,  the  nobility  and  the  criminal  element,  the  former 
on  account  of  its  intimate  connection  with  the  court,  the  latter 
through  its  relations  with  the  police  and  spy  system.  The 
nobility,  it  goes  without  saying,  is  paid  with  privileges, 
governmental  positions  and  disguised  grants  to  landlords  from 
the  treasury  of  the  nation ;  the  mob,  of  course,  with  vodka  or  cash. 
I  have  spoken  of  the  noble  organiser  of  the  League  of  Russian 
Men  in  Odessa.  In  Moscow  Count  Sherebatov  is  at  the  head, 
in  Tula  Count  Bobrinsky,  in  Kursk  and  many  other  governments 
the  head  marshals  of  the  nobility,  in  St.  Petersburg  Count 
Apraxin,  gentleman  of  the  Czar's  bedchamber.  Besides, 
the  league  reckons  on  almost  half  the  court,  including  many 
princes,  generals,  court  chamberlains,  assistant  ministers,  judges 
and  so  on.  All  this  nobiUty  is  vitally  interested  not  only  in  the 
preservation  of  the  court,  the  bureaucracy,  and  the  privileges  of 
landlords,  but  also  in  agrarian  poUtics,  beet  sugar  boimties, 
special  railroad  rates  for  large  exporters  of  the  grain  of  a  starving 
people,  the  abolition  of  land  taxes,  indefinite  loans  from  the 
State  Bank,  the  free  import  of  agricultural  implements,  especially 
of  such  as  they  use  and  the  people  cannot  buy,  and  perhaps  even 
paper  money  in  the  end. 

This  would  seen  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  Jews.  But  it 
is  obligatory  for  every  reactionary  element  that  seeks  to  share  in 
the  plunder  to  do  so  under  the  same  pretext.  Of  course  the 
landlords  manage  to  get  a  special  profit  from  the  persecution  of 
the  Jews.  There  are  no  Jewish  landlords  to  persecute,  since 
Jews  are  not  allowed  to  own  land.  But  there  are  Jewish 
capitalists,  and  like  other  capitalists  these  want  the  whole  state 
policy  to  be  directed  to  benefit  industry  rather  than  agriculture. 
This  unsympathetic  attitude  toward  agriculture  arises  not 
from  the  fact  that  they  are  capitalists,  the  landlords  pretend 
to  believe,  but  from  the  fact  that  they  are  Jews.  Under  the 
accusation  of  being  part  of  a  Jewish  conspiracy  to  imdermine 


82  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Russian  agriculture,  even  industry  itself  is  sometimes  attacked 
and  every  effort  of  foreign  or  Russian  capital  to  advance  it  is 
branded  as  an  anti- Russian,  Jewish,  German  or  English  attempt 
to  control  the  empire  through  the  purse  strings.  From  this 
same  agrarian  quarter  metallic  money  is  already  criticised  and 
may  some  day  be  repudiated  as  a  Jewish  contrivance,  and  the 
payment  of  interest  on  the  international  debt  may  some  day 
be  postponed  as  touching  only  foreigners  and  Jews.  Already 
there  are  grumblings  among  the  nobility  against  un-Russian 
money  and  the  underhand  influence  of  Russia's  creditors.  There 
is  no  doubt  that  at  the  time  of  a  great  financial  crisis  a  tremen- 
dous movement  against  foreign  capital  could  be  created  in 
dominant  Government  circles.  Already  Russian  capitalists 
are  pursued  with  fierce  bitterness  as  friends  and  business 
associates  of  Jews. 

That  Brodski,  a  member  of  the  Russian  sugar  trust,  was  a 
millionaire  did  not  protect  him  from  being  beaten  by  **  patriots  " 
on  the  streets  of  Eaev.  That  Erasmus,  a  wealthy  Jew,  was 
seated  at  the  table  in  a  Moscow  summer  garden  with  a  group 
of  Christian  manufacturers  did  not  prevent  a  "patriot"  leader 
from  joining  the  group  uninvited,  openly  boasting  of  his  murder- 
ous plans,  creating  a  quarrel,  and,  picking  out  the  Jew  for 
for  attack,  shooting  him  dead  in  the  arms  of  his  friends.  Trepov, 
the  murderer,  has  not  been  punished,  for  he  is  the  founder  of 
J    '^the  "League  for  Active  Struggle  against  the  Revolution,"  of 

rCw"     '^^i^^  some  influential  persons  are  members. 

•^  \VC       The  Jews  "are  the  worst  type  of  business  men  and  money- 
makers," says  the  Czar.     But  they  are  half  the  business  men 

'^'  and  money-makers  of  his  empire.     When  we  add  further  than 

nearly  every  non- Jewish  business  man  is  intimately  associated 
with  Jews  in  business,  we  see  that  the  Czar's  feeling  is  really 
directed  against  the  whole  Russian  business  world.  But  does 
he  attack  them  because  they  are  money-makers  or  because  they 
are  Jews?  One  familiar  with  Russian  reaction  will  hesitate  for 
an  answer.  There  must  be  hostility  between  Government  by 
violence  and  business  enterprise.  Business  men  are  hated  by 
the  reactionaries  because  of  their  own  relative  poverty  and 
incapacity  to  earn.  The  plunder  of  the  Government  is  an 
irregular  source  of  income  at  the  best  and  the  big  prizes  are  few. 


"MY   CHIEF   SUPPORT"  83 

/The  officials  want  modem  business  in  Russia,  but  they  want  the 

[profits   for  themselves.     As  they   are  not  business  men  they 

'plunder  those  who  are.     So  when  a  reactionary  says  "Jew" 

he  frequently  means  "business  man."     To  many  of  these  people 

the  ordinary  American  business  man  would  be  thought  of  as, 

or  even  called,  a  Jew. 

The  Government's  favouritism  for  the  League  of  Russian  Men 
in  the  recent  elections  has  brought  out  the  character  of  both 
organisations.  The  league's  chief  nominee  for  the  Duma  in 
Moscow  was  Schmakov,  one  of  the  most  important  of  the 
league's  leaders  in  the  country.  He  declared  after  his  nomina- 
tion that  he  believed  only  in  pure  autocracy,  recognised  neither 
any  Duma  nor  even  merely  a  consultive  assembly  as  being 
consistent  with  autocracy,  and  considered  "that  there  was 
only  one  goal  that  made  life  worth  living,  only  one  task  worthy 
of  man,  the  struggle  against  the  Jews."  If  elected,  he  claimed 
that  his  election  would  give  him  the  right  to  say  it  was  the  will 
of  the  people  to  extirpate  the  Jews.  In  spite  of  all  the  aid  of 
the  Government  and  police  he  was  not  elected.  All  the  fraud, 
bribery,  and  violence  practised  brought  him  in  this  immense 
city  with  all  its  corruptible  elements,  only  a  few  hundred  votes, 
largely  those  of  the  spies  and  other  hangers-on  of  the  police, 
such  as  the  house-porters,  who  are  used  for  police  service,  and 
the  proprietors  of  Government  saloons. 

In  Minsk  the  common  candidate  of  the  league  and  of  the  so- 
called  moderates,  Captain  Schmidt,  was  triumphantly  elected 
against  the  wishes  of  the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  popu- 
lation. In  1 901  Captain  Schmidt  sold  the  plans  of  the  fortress 
of  Cronstadt,  was  caught,  convicted,  sent  to  Siberia  and  lost 
all  his  titles  and  civil  rights.  The  election  law,  aimed  at  the 
revolutionists,  expressly  disqualifies  all  such  persons  and  was 
turned  against  Schmidt  during  the  elections.  But  this  traitor, 
convicted  of  high  treason,  had  been  pardoned  by  the  Czar;  he 
had  only  sold  the  plans,  he  was  not  a  convinced  revolutionist. 
Of  course,  the  Government,  taking  its  cue  from  the  "  Most  High," 
interfered  in  his  behalf  and  declared  his  election  valid.  After 
a  solemn  meeting  of  the  league  in  a  monastery  in  which  God 
was  thanked  for  His  mercy,  the  moderates  and  the  True  Russian 
Men  sent  the  captain  to  represent  them  in  the  Duma.     "Even 


84  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

if  he  is  no  Russian,"  said  the  presiding  officer  in  one  of  the 
meetings,  "nobody  else  defends  so  well  the  Orthodox  faith." 

Such  characters  are  among  the  leaders  of  the  organisation 
from  which  the  Czar  says  he  expects  his  "chief  support"; 
ruffians,  murderers,  and  men  ready  to  sell  their  country  for 
a  song.  It  is  these  men  and  their  noble  friends  in  and  out  of 
the  bureaucracy  and  court  that  are  the  most  influential,  because 
the  most  active,  element  in  the  "legal "  political  life  of  the  Russia 
of  to-day.  It  is  they  that  demand  daily  in  their  official  organ 
the  exclusion  of  all  the  democrats  from  the  Duma,  the  arrest 
of  Hessen,  Milyoukov,  and  Kutler,  the  most  moderate  leaders 
of  the  moderate  reform  party,  and  the  regular  and  systematic 
beating,  as  part  of  their  punishment,  of  all  the  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  political  prisoners  in  the  jails.  Nor  are  these 
demands  unreasonable,  viewed  from  the  standpoint  of  recent 
actions  of  the  Russian  Government.  Only  a  few  years  ago 
Prince  Dolgorukov  was  exiled  for  merely  expressing  the  mod- 
erate wishes  of  the  official  local  government  boards,  and  the 
entire  membership  of  one  democratic  party  is  now  locked 
up  and  under  trial.  The  Government  still  declares  the  moderate 
party  illegal;  why  should  its  leaders  not  be  arrested?  There  is 
scarcely  a  prison  in  Russia  where  beating  is  not  occasionally 
employed,  to  say  nothing  of  the  open  flogging  of  whole  villages 
of  peasants;  why  should  this  beating  not  be  made  universal? 
The  league  demands  also  the  removal  of  unsuitable  "humane" 
chiefs  of  police,  and  more  frequent  shooting  by  the  police  of 
suspected  persons.  But  has  not  General  Rennenkampf  already 
said,  in  an  official  order,  that  there  were  too  few  deaths  and 
that  the  soldiers  must  shoot  to  kill?  And  has  not  the  Czar 
just  promoted  the  famous  general  in  full  knowledge  of  this 
notorious  order,  and  of  the  general's  campaign  against  the 
"inner  enemy"  in  Siberia  when  he  ordered  a  whole  committee 
that  came  to  him  with  a  complaint  to  be  executed  ?  Why  should 
not  the  league  hope  for  the  worst? 

The  league  knows  that  the  Government's  legal  persecution 
of  the  Jews  has  proceeded  to  a  point  where  Governor  Urussov 
confesses  that  it  constitutes  the  chief  business  of  the  provincial 
governors.  It  also  remembers  its  own  successes;  that  its 
agitation  and  demonstrations  brought  on  the  great  massacres 


••MY   CHIEF   SUPPORT"  85 

of  1905,  that  in  many  places  the  Government  openly  partici- 
pated, as  in  Tiflis  where  the  governor  ordered  the  military 
band  to  lead  their  procession,  and  that  at  Odessa  the  governor, 
Neiahardt,  to  this  day  unpunished,  quoted  in  the  official 
pronunciamentos  the  league's  own  proclamation  to  the  effect  that 
'  *  thirty  thousand  small  bourgeois  had  threatened  to  bum  the 
university  if  the  revolutionary  activities  of  the  students  did 
not  cease,  and  that  he  lent  them  all  his  power  to  promote 
instead  of  to  hinder  the  most  horrible  massacre  of  all  the  bloody 
history  of  the  modem  empire." 

The  league  knows  that  at  Tver  its  members  were  allowed 
to  besiege  in  broad  daylight  the  building  in  which  the  pro- 
gressive employers  of  the  local  government  board  were  holding 
a  meeting,  to  set  it  afire  and  to  kill  and  cripple  those  who  escaped, 
all  before  the  eyes  of  the  assembled  troops,  until  finally  a  single 
volley  fired  in  the  air  easily  put  an  end  to  the  supposedly  irre- 
pressible disturbance.  In  Baku  the  German  consul  telegraphed 
a  protest  against  the  proposed  demonstration  which  he  was 
sure  would  lead  to  massacre.  He  received  as  answer  that 
"German  citizens"  would  be  protected,  and  the  massacre  took 
place  according  to  the  schedule.  The  league  knows  also  that 
to-day  Government  buildings  are  turned  over  to  its  use,  that 
Government  officials,  especially  local  officials  or  those  elected 
by  the  privileged  electoral  bodies  of  the  Russian  law,  preside 
over  its  meetings,  that  the  most  influential  persons  are  pub- 
licly or  secretly  connected  with  it,  that  the  grand  dukes  and 
Government  newspapers  have  expressed  their  cordial  approval, 
and  that  the  Czar  has  given  them  every  encouragement  within 
his  power.  Why  should  it  not  demand  the  arrest  of  all  the 
moderate  and  liberal  leaders  and  the  flogging  of  the  political 
prisoners  under  arrest  ? 

No  wonder,  then,  that  they  boldly  attack  even  the  Czar^s 
prime  minister  for  his  desire  to  re-shape  the  Czarism,  to  con- 
vert it  into  a  stronger  and  more  orderly  if  not  less  oppressive 
system,  and  to  place  every  activity  of  the  league  under  legal 
and  official  restraint.  There  is  raging  a  real  war  between  the  two 
powers,  but  it  is  of  little  benefit  to  Russia.  Taking  advantage 
of  the  state  of  martial  law,  Stolypine  confiscates  the  league 
organ,    the   Russian   Flag.     But    Dr.    Dubrowin   replies    that 


86  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

martial  law  applies  to  revolutionists  and  not  to  patriots  like 
himself,  and  is  sustained  by  the  Senate,  the  highest  court  of 
the  country.  Stolypine  sees  that  even  martial  law  cannot  be 
equally  or  evenly  applied  in  a  Czarism.  But  still  under  martial 
law  he  has  an  additional  power  and  it  is  his  only  hold  against 
the  "spontaneous"  and  relatively  democratic  action  of  the 
league. 

Against  the  disorder  of  the  reaction,  as  well  as  the  disorder 
I  of  the  revolution,  Stolypine 's  only  remedy  is  the  disorder  of 
*«  martial  law.  What  government  by  martial  law  is  in  Russia 
I  shall  show  later.  Here  I  only  wish  to  show  not  only  how  the 
reactionary  disorder  can  work  through  the  disorder  of  martial 
law,  but  that  it  must  inevitably  do  so  since  the  army  officers  are 
on  the  whole  as  reactionary  as  any  official  body  in  the  coimtry, 
and  every  other  group  of  officials  to  whom  martial  law  is 
supposed  to  give  this  power  of  life  and  death  are  as  bad  as  they. 
An  example  of  non-military  officials  to  whom  it  is  proposed 
to  give  absolute  power  of  life  and  death  are  the  county  "land 
officials"  or  "zemsky  natchalniki."  These  men  already  have 
unheard  of  powers.  The  peasants  have  never  seen  the  gover- 
nor and  higher  officials  even  of  the  provincial  government. 
For  them  this  "  zemsky  natchalnik"  is  already  czar,  and  most  of 
the  thousands  of  revolts  of  recent  years  have  been  directed 
mainly  against  him.  These  officials  are  almost  universally 
reactionaries  —  none  others  would  accept  the  popular  hatred 
that  goes  with  the  function. 

Everywhere  the  important  "land  officials"  who  may  play 
such  a  r61e  in  the  near  future,  are  most  active  in  the  circles  of 
the  league.  Recently  one  of  them  was  entirely  missing  from 
his  ordinary  duties  for  several  weeks.  He  was  sought  for  in 
vain  by  the  peasants,  the  marshal  of  the  nobility,  the  other 
officials  and  the  local  and  provincial  police.  He  could  not 
be  found  because  nobody  dared  interfere  with  the  more  impor- 
tant labours  to  which  he  had  abandoned  himself.  He  was  vice- 
president  of  the  Smolensk  league,  was  attending  all  this  time 
league  meetings  and  conferences  in  the  provincial  capital.  This 
brings  an  ordinary  picture  of  the  fusion  of  the  local  govern- 
ment with  the  league. 

The   extreme   reactionaries    are   indispensable   to    the   new 


( 


"MY   CHIEF    SUPPORT"  87 

Government,  whichever  way  it  turns.  If  the  policy  is  to  be  the 
reign  of  martial  law,  made  practically  universal  and  steadily 
maintained,  as  Minister  Stolypine  seems  to  desire,  then  a  large 
majority  of  all  the  more  zealous  army  officers,  those  who  perform 
with  zest  and  interest  this  poUce  work  of  crushing  the  "internal 
enemy,"  are  connected  with  one  of  the  reactionary  leagues  or 
unions.  If  Stolypine  goes  further  toward  the  creation  of  local 
czars  and  special  police  whose  chief  duty  it  is  to  fight  the  revo- 
lution, he  must  rely  almost  entirely  on  the  same  type  of  men. 
If  he  wishes  to  return  to  the  plan  of  creating  an  artificial  counter- 
revolutionary movement  among  the  people,  he  finds  all  the 
arrangements,  prestige,  and  popular  leaders  already  monopo- 
lised by  the  league.  The  league  is  also  as  strong  in  the  Duma 
as  St oly pine's  moderate  reactionary  friends,  and  stronger  in 
the  upper  house. 

It  cannot  be  questioned  that  the  immediate  future  of  Russia 
is  largely  in  the  hands  of  professional  agitators  of  the  League 
of  Russian  Men.  The  underlying  reason  for  this  lies  in  the 
simple  fact  of  human  nature,  that  intelligent  and  high-minded 
men  cannot  be  obtained  to  serve  a  government  at  war  with 
its  own  people.  The  work  of  drowning  in  blood  the  struggle 
of  all  kinds  of  people  to  secure  the  most  elementary  rights 
and  self-government,  is  a  task  for  dull  and  brutal  men.  Nothing 
is  more  to  the  credit  of  the  Russian  nation  at  the  present 
moment  than  that  the  worst  of  her  citizens  as  a  rule  occupy 
the  higher  position  in  the  State. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

WHAT    HAPPENED    TO    "tHE     CONSTITUTION** 

IN  THE  same  audience  in  which  Nicholas  promised  the  League 
of  Russian  Men  that  he  would  "think  over"  their  petition 
to  refuse  the  rights  of  Russian  citizens  to  the  Jews,  one  of  the 
league's  representatives  prayed  His  Majesty  also  that  he  should 
preserve  the  old  principle  of  autocracy  — in  a  word,  that  he 
should  grant  no  constitution.  The  Czar  replied  in  an  unmis- 
takable affirmative,  that  he  would  give  an  account  of  his 
power  to  God, 

So  we  find  always  linked  together  the  call  for  persecution  and 
outspoken  hostility  to  constitutional  government.  One  of  the 
persecuted  races,  the  Mohammedans,  formed  a  league  "to 
further  constitutional  government  in  Russia."  Several 
government  officials  thought  the  league  might  be  legalised  on  the 
ground  that  a  constitutional  limitation  of  the  Czar's  power 
already  existed  in  the  fact  that  the  Czar  could  not  change  the 
so-called  fundamental  laws  without  the  consent  of  the  Duma. 
The  prefect  of  St.  Petersburg  took  the  opposite  view,  and  the 
highest  court  in  the  country  has  finally  decided  with  him  that 
it  is  illegal  in  Russia  for  any  organisation  even  to  ask  for  consti- 
tutional government. 

At  the  time  of  the  great  massacres  constitutionalists  were  not 
distinguished  from  Jews.  Indeed  the  chief  purpose  of  Trepov 
and  the  grand  dukes  at  that  time  was  to  put  an  end  to  the  cry 
for  a  modem  form  of  government.  Their  purpose  reached  down 
to  the  lowest  officials  that  were  superintending  the  killing. 
So  in  the  small  town  of  New  Zybkov,  in  Tchemigov,  the  police 
captain,  with  a  telegram  from  the  governor  in  his  hands, 
mounted  a  carriage  and  declared  to  the  people: 

*'  Gentlemen,  there  is  no  constitution,  there  are  no  liberties. 
What  was  said  here  yesterday  was  invented  by  our  enemies 
the  Jews,  Doctor  Ivanov  and   Bagolioupov.     Now  you  can  do 

88 


WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  "THE  CONSTITUTION"      89 

what  you  please  to  them.  You  are  given  this  right."  Immedi- 
ately a  part  of  the  crowd  commenced  assaulting  and  killing  the 
Jews. 

One  third  of  the  members  of  the  new  Duma  deny  that  there 
is  a  constitution  and  another  third  refuse  to  assert  officially 
that  there  is  one.  The  Czar  and  Stolypine  in  the  meanwhile 
reassert  the  existence  of  an  unlimited  autocracy,  and  both 
refuse  so'  much  as  to  mention  the  supposedly  constitutional 
promises  of  October  17,  1905,  to  say  nothing  of  reasserting 
them.  The  coup  d'etat  of  the  3rd  of  June,  1907,  by  which  the 
Duma  was  made  over  into  an  assembly  of  officials  and  landlords, 
practically  annulled  these  promises  in  repealing  the  previous 
election  statute  that  had  been  soberly  granted  by  the  Czar  as  a 
"fundamental"  law.  There  is,  then,  no  real  need  for  the 
extreme  reactionaries  of  the  Duma  to  assert  and  reassert  that 
there  is  no  constitution,  that  whatever  the  Czar  has  granted 
he  has  the  right  to  take  away.  Already  he  has  done  this. 
Already  all  semblance  of  a  constitution  has  disappeared,  and  as 
long  as  the  Duma  has  no  control  whatever  over  the  Government 
it  remains  merely  a  king's  council,  no  matter  how  the  majority 
may  try  to  dodge  the  plain  statement. 

Persecution  reigns  and  the  autocracy  is  triumphant.  The 
anxiety  of  the  extreme  loyalists  is  not  so  much  for  the  present 
as  for  the  future.  If  the  Czarism  is  to  be  preserved,  the 
persecution  must  go  on  undiminished ;  if  it  is  to  be  strengthened, 
the  persecution  must  be  intensified.  So  all  the  extreme 
reactionaries  speaking  in  the  Duma  for  autocracy  and  against 
constitution  have  occupied  themselves  almost  exclusively  with 
attacks  on  the  Poles  and  Jews.  And  they  have  already 
succeeded  in  getting  a  majority  of  the  body  on  their  side  against 
these  races.  Stolypine,  too,  willingly  or  unwillingly,  must 
follow.  A  few  days  after  the  encouragement  he  received  from 
these  debates,  he  closed  the. Polish  School  Union  that  has  opened 
780  schools  in  the  year  or  two  it  had  been  allowed  to  exist. 
His  onslaught  on  the  painfully -won  liberties  of  Finland  probably 
means  that,  even  here  where  the  conquests  of  the  revolution 
seemed  secure,  nearly  everything  will  again  be  taken  away. 

The  chief  party  of  the  third  Duma,  the  moderate  reactionary 
Octobrists,  have  tried  to  avoid  the  issue.     They  secured  the 


90  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

consent  of  212  out  of  the  440  members  that  the  Duma  in  its 

address  of  thanks  to  the  Czar  should   avoid   both   the   words 

autocracy  and  constitution.  As  the  democratic  and  Polish  groups 

abstained  from  voting  this  remains  the  Duma's  position  on  the 

question  of  the  constitution,  but  not  so  on  that  of  autocracy. 

Only  1 46  reactionaries  voted  to  recognise  the  unlimited  autocracy 

on  this  occasion,  but  more  than  a  hundred  others  have  recognised 

it  on  every  other.     If  two  votes  were  taken,  instead  of  one, 

the  Duma  would  vote  against  the  existence  of  a  constitution  and 

in  favour  of  the  autocracy.     The  present  anomalous  position 

of  certain  timid  constitutionalists  by  which  they  acknowledged 

autocracy  every  day  and  cannot  use  the  very  word  constitution 

or  any  equivalent,  is  defended  by  such  false  and  shameless 

I  subtleties  as  that  the  title  autocrat  refers  only  to  independence 

from  foreign  powers  and  not  to  independence  of  the  people,  and 

I  that  the  discussion  whether  Russia  has  a  constitution  or  is 

I  governed  like  China  or  Turkey  is  "a  purely  verbal"  or  "specu- 

\  lative   question."     This   is   the   position   of   the   Government 

itself  in  the  Russia^  its  official  organ. 

In  the  meanwhile  the  Duma's  cowardly  refusal  to  face  the 
one  issue  that  is  uppermost  in  Russian  life  and  includes  every 
other  question,  has  forced  it  to  make  other  and  still  more 
dangerous  concessions  to  the  Government's  brutal  power. 
In  his  declaration  of  his  ministerial  policy  Stolypine  did  not 
mention  the  Czar's  Manifesto  of  the  1 7th  of  October,  the  Magna 
Charta  of  Russian  liberty,  or  at  least  the  only  official  charter 
of  Russia's  hopes.  A  conservative  member,  Prince  Lvov, 
moved  that  the  Duma  at  any  rate  recognised  the  continued 
validity  of  this  instrument.  The  party  of  the  17th  of  October 
thereupon  voted  down  the  motion  and  denied  its  own  name 
and  reason  for  existence.  Like  the  extremists,  the  moderate 
reactionaries  demand  nothing,  and  accept  everything,  from  the 
Government.  Russia's  so-called  representative  assembly  claims 
neither  a  constitution,  a  fundamental  law,  nor  any  rights  of  the 
citizen.  It  is  simply  another  council  of  the  servants  of  absolu- 
tism, another  arm  of  the  already  cumbrous  bureaucratic  system. 
The  leader  of  the  new  majority,  Alexander  Gutchkov, 
explained  the  position  of  his  party  in  the  following  dark  but 
explicable  manner.      In  a  few   years  of  the  new  Duma  there 


WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  "THE  CONSTITUTION"      91 

would  be  no  strife  among  its  leading  parties  about  this  question 
of  the  form  of  government.  They  would  all  be  satisfied  with 
the  practical  results.  His  party  was  of  the  view  that  a  consti- 
tution existed,  that  the  Czar  himself  had  limited  his  own  power. 
But  he  would  not  insist  on  the  extreme  reactionaries  recognising 
that  there  was  a  system  of  government  other  than  the  will  of 
the  Czar.  All  parties  could  agree  to  accept  the  Czar's  own 
term  for  the  instrument  that  had  brought  the  change,  namely 
the  Act  of  October  1 7th.  As  we  have  seen,  Gutchkov's  intended 
friends  of  the  extreme  reaction  would  not  bear  a  reference  even 
to  this  instrument,  since  it  is  now  tabooed  by  the  Government. 
But,  so  satisfied  apparently  is  he  with  the  present  Duma  and 
the  harmony  to  come  from  it,  that  he  consented  to  abandon  the 
only  principle  through  which  his  party  came  into  being.  Or 
perhaps  his  consent  was  unwilling. 

Between  the  moderate  and  extreme  reactionaries  is  what 
we  might  call  the  reactionary  centre,  a  group  of  over  a  hundred 
landlords  without  whom  Gutchkov  cannot  hope  to  form  a 
majority.  The  landlords  by  no  means  agree  with  Gutchkov; 
they  have  not  decided  whether  they  can  expect  more  from  the 
new  Duma  that  has  resulted  from  the  Manifesto  of  October 
17th,  or  from  a  return  to  the  older  form.  They  are  not  so 
optimistic  about  the  Duma.  Gutchkov 's  enthusiastic  party 
is  composed  mostly  of  officials,  rich  merchants,  and  indus- 
trialists. Under  the  old  regime  the  court  influence  of  the 
landlords  had  only  the  bureaucracy  to  contend  against.  Gutch- 
kov does  not  care  about  the  constitution  so  much  as  about 
his  Duma.  The  landlords  don't  care  so  much  about  the  Duma 
and  the  October  Manifesto  as  they  do  about  their  power  over 
the  Czar  through  the  court.  The  landlords  alone  cannot  control 
the  Duma,  any  more  than  can  Gutchkov,  but  they  have  carefully 
provided  Russia  with  an  election  law  that  gives  them  a  power 
equal  to,  or  greater  than,  that  of  any  other  class.  For  the 
landlords,  that  is  the  nobility,  can  do  nearly  what  they  please; 
they  are  the  foundation  of  the  throne. 

The  leader  of  the  Duma  was  careful  to  add  to  his  confession 
of  constitutional  faith  that  he  did  not  consider  that  the  Czar's 
voluntary  limitation  of  the  unlimited  autocracy  had  decreased 
his  power.     No,  the  new  Duma  would  be  a  counterweight  against 


92  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  encroachments  of  the  bureaucracy  and  the  court  on  the 
Czar's  power.  As  we  have  seen,  however,  a  part  of  this  counter- 
weight consists  of  officials,  a  second  and  larger  part  of  the 
landlord  nobility,  the  matrix  both  of  the  higher  officialdom 
and  of  the  court.  The  third  part  represents  the  wealthy 
merchants  and  manufacturers,  by  whom  Gutchkov's  party 
was  first  created,  but  in  it  is  a  considerable  number  also  of  the 
less  reactionary  landlords.  It  is,  then,  largely  from  the  increased 
power  of  the  landlords  that  Gutchkov  hopes  to  control  the  court. 
Indeed  he  has  said  as  much.  It  is  also  from  the  power  of  the 
most  privileged  of  Russian  capitalists,  which  the  election 
law  favours,  that  he  hopes  to  curb  officialdom.  But  I  shall 
show  that  the  majority  of  Russian  capital  lives  from  official 
privileges  and  Government  contracts  and  has  a  corresponding 
influence  in  the  bureaus,  just  as  the  landlords  live  from  and 
control  the  court. 

Gutchkov's  career,   his  extensive  travels,   his  service   as  a 
^Voluntary  administrator  of  the  Red  Cross  during  the  Japanese 

I  wax  and  as  president  of  the  Moscow  Municipal  Council,  sug- 

I  gest  that  he  is  a  sincere  reformer  rather  than  a  merely  ambitious 
man.     But  he  seems  to  have  become  a  fanatic  of  one  idea  and 

1  a  bitter  enemy  of  all  who  disagree  with  his  estimate  of  its  value. 
That  idea  is  that  any  assembly  of  men,  however  constituted 
and  however  limited  in  its  power,  that  bears  the  name  of  Duma 
has  the  ability  to  regenerate  poor  Russia.  The  name  "consti- 
tution" or  "Manifesto  of  October  17th"  he  is  ready  to  abandon. 
The  name  "Duma"  retains  all  the  wonder-working  power  of 
a  Russian  ikon.  Indeed  his  paper  speaks  literally  of  the 
Duma's  "sacred  walls."     He  is  the  only  disinterested  public 

;  man  of  any  great  moment  in  Russia  who  expects  the  Russian 
landlords  and  contractors  to  relinquish  their  power  over  the 
officialdom  and  the  court. 

But  what  is  the  meaning  of  the  Duma  to  the  Government? 
First  of  all,  the  Government's  financial  credit  abroad  is  steadily 
falling,  and  it  hopes  to  impress  the  little  French  and  German 
investors  who  keep  it  from  bankruptcy,  that  Russia  has  a  loyal 
popular  assembly  that  votes  all  the  loans  and  taxes  the  Govern- 
ment requires.  That  the  majority  of  this  Duma  consists  of  indi- 
viduals who  are  living  by  direct  subsidies  in  one  form  or  another 


WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  "THE  CONSTITUTION"      93 

from  the  Government  is  a  fact  it  is  hoped  the  small  investor 
will  overlook.  Second,  the  Duma  serves  a  purpose  inside  of  the 
country.  It  unifies  the  bureaucracy,  the  court,  the  landlords, 
and  other  privileged  classes  against  all  pressure  of  the  masses 
of  the  people  from  below  to  secure  a  democratic  form  of  gov- 
ernment. It  enlists  definitely  on  the  Government's  side  all  those 
who  are  in  any  way  dependent  upon  it,  and  gives  to  each  element 
a  definite  r61e  to  fill  in  the  national  defence  against  progress 
: — which,  of  course,  depends  entirely  on  the  further  democra- 
tisation  of  the  state. 

"The  Government  must  have  a  firm  will  in  this  matter," 
said  Stolypine  to  the  Duma;  "but  this  is  not  enough,  the  will 
of  the  Duma  must  be  added  to  that  of  the  Government." 
Count  W.  Bobrinsky,  in  the  name  of  the  landlords,  the  heart 
of  the  reactionary  majority,  had  just  used  almost  the  same 
words:  "The  Duma  without  a  strong  Government  is  nothing," 
said  he,  "but  the  struggle  of  the  Government  against  the 
revolutionary  excesses  without  the  Duma  is  unproductive. 
Without  the  Duma  the  Government  cannot  accomplish  the 
pacification  of  the  country."  This  pacification  accomplished, 
it  remains  to  be  seen  if  the  Government  or  the  landlords  will 
have  any  further  need  of  the  Duma.  They  do  not  have  to 
abolish  it.  The  Czar  or  the  upper  council  can  as  hitherto  veto 
its  acts,  more  pressure  can  be  brought  to  bear  on  the  elections, 
or  the  election  law  can  again  be  modified  by  the  Czar  or  again 
interpreted  by  the  Senate  to  suit  the  occasion.  Or  perhaps 
Gutchkov  will  see  that  discretion  is  the  better  part  of  valour, 
and  in  order  to  preserve  the  form  of  the  present  "sacred" 
Duma  will  definitely  abandon,  one  at  a  time,  every  shadow 
of  social  reform. 

For  there  is  a  party  in  Russia  that  is  composed  largely  of 
capable  and  devoted  reformers,  a  party  that  has  at  the  same 
time  given  aid  to  the  revolution  only  in  an  indirect  manner 
as  a  last  desperate  resort.  This  party  desires  a  constitution, 
fundamental  changes  in  the  structure  of  the  Government;  but 
it  is  so  anxious  for  the  social  elevation  of  the  masses  that  it  has 
been  willing  to  give  up  its  greater  hopes  for  the  slow  and  diffi- 
cult work  which  alone  is  possible  under  the  present  system. 
When  the  revolution  seemed  about  to  triumph,  the  party  mem- 


94  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

bers  were  ready  to  put  aside  their  administrative  work  to  lay 
the  foundation  for  a  greater  edifice.  When  the  Government 
was  for  the  time  victorious  over  the  revolution,  they  were  ready 
to  take  up  again  their  difficult  and  almost  hopeless  task  of  trying 
to  bring  about  a  little  progress  in  the  local  administration  in  the 
face  of  the  hostility  of  the  local  officials  and  landlord  caste. 
^■\  I  am  speaking  of  the  party  of  the  famous  "zemstvos,"  or  local 
government  boards.  The  majority  of  the  professional  em- 
ployees and  workers  were  members  of  the  Constitutional  Demo- 
cratic Party,  a  smaller  part  of  the  more  conservative  "peaceful 
regenerators"  or  even  of  the  liberal  wing  of  the  Octobrists, 
Gutchkov's  organisation.  A  few  were  populists  or  independent 
progressives,  more  radical  than  the  Constitutional  Democrats. 

But  the  local  government  boards  are  elected  mainly  by 
landlords.  Liberals  were  on  the  administrative  committees 
and  radicals  were  employed  as  doctors,  veterinaries,  teachers, 
agricultural  experts  and  statisticians  only  because  the  over- 
whelming reactionary  majorities  among  the  landlords  did  not 
take  the  pains  to  vote.  As  soon  as  the  revolutionary  movement 
began  among  the  peasants,  their  tenants  and  labourers,  the 
landlords  began  to  assert  their  principles.  The  results  surprised 
even  the  Russians.  Two  years  ago,  of  the  thirty  odd  provincial 
zemstvos,  nearly  every  one  was  liberally  administered;  now 
all  but  one  are  in  conservative  or  reactionary  hands,  and  in  the 
several  hundred  subordinate  district  boards  the  proportion  is 
similar.  Experienced  and  devoted  landlord  administrators 
are  giving  place  to  ignorant  and  pronounced  reactionaries, 
looked  on  as  enemies  by  the  people  they  are  supposed  to  serve ; 
fOT  else  occasionally,  which  is  sadder  to  relate,  some  mild  liberal 
V  surrenders  his  principles  and  remains  in  office.  The  elections 
showed  only  5  or  lo  per  cent,  of  Constitutional  Democrats 
and  a  still  smaller  proportion  of  liberals  of  every  other  variety. 
Faithful  employees,  of  whom  tens  of  thousands  have  devoted 
themselves  heart,  mind,  and  body  to  the  peasants  and  the 
practical  application  of  their  science,  have  been  discharged. 
Hospital  after  hospital,  school  after  school,  has  been  closed 
because  the  new  administrators  have  been  unwilling  to  make  the 
sacrifices  by  which  alone  the  old  were  able  to  sustain  their  work 
under  Russia's  wretched  government. 


WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  "THE  CONSTITUTION"      95 

The  least  public  spirit  ends  at  once  the  career  of  any 
employee,  as  it  did  that  of  Chief  Engineer  Skriabin,  of  Vologda, 
who  merely  complained  to  the  governor  of  the  tolerated  beating 
of  the  Jews.  The  poor  consecrated  teachers  with  their  pittance 
of  ten  or  fifteen  dollars  a  month,  one-fifth  of  the  rather  low 
average  of  the  whole  United  States,  get  the  worst  of  it.  All 
over  Russia  the  conditions  of  the  teachers  are  more  or  less  the 
same.  Two  recent  despatches  from  widely  separated  points 
testify  what  these  heroes,  on  whom  the  future  of  this  half- 
illiterate  people  hangs,  are  going  through  with.  Each  incident 
is  similar  to  hundreds  of  the  kind. 

"The  Glosov  zemstvo  treasury  is  empty.  The  men  and 
women  teachers  have  been  wandering  about  the  streets  several 
days  trying  to  get  a  few  pennies  to  travel  away  with.  Even 
in  this  they  failed." 

"  Kuznetz.  In  the  whole  district  there  are  only  two  teachers 
in  freedom.  All  the  rest  are  arrested."  If  this  district  is  like 
the  others  in  size,  the  despatch  means  that  some  hundred 
teachers  were  too  radical  to  suit  the  landlords  or  police. 

In  these  zemstvos  lay  Russia's  only  hope  for  a  democra- 
tisation  of  local  government,  the  basis  of  every  free  society. 
Very  slowly,  indeed  at  a  most  discouraging  rate,  but  nevertheless 
surely,  they  were  teaching  the  people  modem  culture  through 
books,  healthy  living  through  doctors  and  hospitals,  and  modem 
farming  through  the  sale  of  modem  machines  and  the  object 
lessons  of  the  veterinaries  and  agricultural  experts  —  to  say 
nothing  of  the  invaluable  personal  influence  of  Russia's  most 
useful  citizens,  the  zemstvos,  employees.  Besides,  they  were 
the  only  effective  means  of  fighting  the  periodical  cholera 
epidemics  and  the  almost  chronic  famines.  Without  them  even 
the  insufficient  svmis  dedicated  to  these  vital  purposes  are 
desecrated  or  unequally  distributed. 

Now  the  zemstvos  as  reform  institutions  are  a  thing  of  the 
past,  and  the  wish  of  the  most  hated  of  all  of  Russia's  ministers 
is  accomplished.  Von  Plehve  several  years  ago  recognised  that 
the  zemstvos  were  slowly  modernising  the  Russian  peasant. 
This  is  why  he  exiled  Prince  Dolgorukov  who  presented  their 
wishes  to  the  Czar,  notwithstanding  that  the  clemency  of 
Nicholas  had  been  promised.     And  this  is  why  he  executed  his 


96  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

notorious  cleaning  out  of  the  Tver  zemstvo  that  contained 
Roditchev  and  Petrunkevitch,  later  founders  of  the  Consti- 
tutional Democratic  Party,  and  other  capable  liberals. 

In  advance  of  most  of  the  other  local  government  boards, 
the  Tver  organisation  was  making  a  visible  improvement  in 
the  province,  which  is  as  much  as  to  say  that  it  was  moving  in 
many  directions  against  the  reactionary  principles  of  the  St. 
Petersburg  authorities.  A  notorious  official  named  Sturmer 
was  therefore  sent  to  inspect,  with  full  powers.  Nearly  all  the 
employees  were  dismissed,  the  teachers  not  wishing  to  submit 
to  individual  persecution  resigned  in  a  body,  the  elected  council 
was  removed  and  von  Plehve  appointed  his  own  nominees  to 
take  their  places.  To-day  Sturmer  is  again  being  promoted  for 
his  zeal.  But  he  is  not  needed  for  this  particular  work  now. 
The  landlords  are  awake  and  the  machine  of  the  Government 
is  turned  no  longer  against  a  single  provincial  group,  but  against 
the  whole  liberal  organisation,  and  the  Senate  has  once  more 
declared  the  whole  Constitutional  Democratic  Party  to  be 
outside  of  the  Russian  law. 

Milyoukov  in  the  Duma  may  well  complain  against  the 
sincerity  of  Stoly pine's  political  and  social  reforms.  What 
more  inevitable  than  that  Stolypine  should  hand  over  his 
proposed  reform  of  local  government  to  a  committee  of  reac- 
tionary landlords  ?  Still  more  significant  is  the  prime  minister's 
land  reform  that  must  serve  as  the  basis  for  the  people's  lives 
in  the  future.  Two  years  ago  even  the  most  reactionary  Party 
of  Legal  Order,  when  organising  a  peasants'  section,  was  forced 
to  incorporate  a  proposed  measure,  the  compulsory  alienation 
of  the  landlords'  land  for  the  peasants'  benefit,  in  its  platform. 
The  moderate  Constitutional  Democrats  still  retain  the 
measure  as  the  only  possible  solution  of  the  question  —  though 
they  are  willing  that  the  State  should  pay  a  fair  price.  Now 
Stolypine  actually  proposes,  to  quote  Milyoukov,  instead  of  the 
expropriation  of  the  landlords,  compulsory  expropriation  of  the 
peasants  —  a  "reform"  which  would  benefit  only  the  relatively 
few  small  peasant  landlords,  to  the  injury  of  all  the  poorer 
peasants,  as  former  ministers  and  imperial  councils  have  repeat- 
edly acknowledged.  It  is  proposed  to  rob  the  peasants  of  the 
protection  of  their  commune,  by  giving  each  individual  for  the 


i  ..wtuxraph  by  Bulla,  St.  Petersburji 

A    VICTIM   OF   THE   CZAR'S    MURDERERS 

To  the  left,  Russia's  greatest  financial  authority,  Herzenstein,  murdered  by 
the  League  of  Russian  Men,  the  Czar's  favourite  organisation;  to  the  right,  the 
publicist  Kovalevski 


10  15  20  25 


Longituae      40        East  from      45       Greeuwicb      50     ".p- 


MAP    SHOWING   POLITICAL  DIVISIONS    IN   RUSSIA 

From  the  heavily  shaded  provinces  the  majority  of  the  peasant  deputies  belonged 
to  the  revolutionary  parties ;  from  the  lighter  shaded  provinces  majority  belonged 
to  Labour  Group ;  the  peasants  elsewhere  also  strongly  oppositional.  Conditions 
in  Poland  and  Baltic  Provinces  too  complicated  to  be  shown  on  a  map. 


WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  "THE  CONSTITUTION"      97 

first  time  a  right  to  sell  his  share  in  the  village  property.  But 
in  a  famine  ridden  country  this  right  to  sell  is  a  right  to  ruin. 
No  peasant  will  prefer  to  die  rather  than  sell  his  land. 

Stoly pine's  land  reform  is,  then,  to  create  a  few  million 
prosperous  peasants  alongside  of  a  class  of  landless  labourers 
that  will  number  five  or  ten  times  as  many.  But  Russian 
industry  is  already  overcrowded  with  almost  starving  workmen. 
These  new  labourers  will  have  to  sell  themselves  for  a  few 
crumbs  to  their  neighbours,  and  in  famine  periods  be  supported 
even  in  greater  numbers  than  at  present  by  the  State.  They 
will  have  no  power  to  raise  their  wages  above  the  starvation 
point,  for  already  agricultural  strikes  have  been  called  rebellion. 
Under  this  "reform"  the  majority  of  the  peasants  will  be  the 
economic  serfs  of  their  close-fisted  and  often  needy  neighbours 
instead  of  belonging  as  now  to  the  rich  and  often  absent 
noblemen.  The  cost  of  keeping  them  alive  and  in  subjection 
will  be  an  added  burden  to  the  State,  and  no  revolutionary 
movement  will  be  too  desperate  to  find  its  common  soldiers  in 
this  element. 

Stoly  pine,  like  his  predecessor,  Witte,  has  lost  all  hope  for 
the  mass  of  the  Russian  people  "in  this  epoch."  He  says 
that  freedom  on  paper  can  only  become  real  freedom  when 
small  proprietors  are  created.  In  opposition  to  him  Rodit- 
chev  finds  that  all  the  Czar  can  do  is  to  abolish  privileges,  make 
all  equal  before  the  law,  first  of  all  the  officials  themselves, 
cease  to  be  a  Czar  of  the  nobility,  and  become  a  Czar  of  all  the 
Russians.  Stoly  pine's  proposed  extension  of  the  so-called 
benevolent  activities  of  the  Government  is  simply  a  pretext 
for  a  simultaneous  extension  of  its  brute  power.  Half  of  his 
declaration  to  the  third  Duma  was  taken  up  with  threats  against 
officials,  judges,  and  teachers  who  are  not  reactionary  enough 
to  suit  the  Government.  Even  the  more  liberal  of  the  Octob- 
rists  were  forced  to  protest.  They  wished  to  know  whether 
officials  were  compelled  to  oppose  their  moderate  reactionary 
party,  whether  the  radical  students,  "our  own  children"  as 
one  speaker  truly  remarked,  were  to  be  treated  in  the  old  inhuman 
way,  and  whether  order  could  not  be  restored  by  lawful  means. 
Stolypine  had  said  that  the  Government  would  be  compelled 
to  do  nothing  by  fear  of  a  movement  from  below,  that  "com- 


98  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

prehensive  rights"  would  be  granted  only  from  a  "superfluity 
of  strength  "  and  not  through  fear  on  the  part  of  the  Government. 
Milyoukov  asked  if  these  high-handed  measures  were  those  of 
confident  power.  Evidently  the  day  of  "superfluous  strength" 
has  not  arrived. 

The  moderate  reactionaries  protested  but  they  did  not 
revolt.  Stolypine  cracked  his  whip,  demanded  them  to  vote 
against  the  reaffirmation  even  of  the  October  Manifesto, the  basis 
of  their  party  platform,  and  was  obeyed.  The  official  Govern- 
ment organ  gave  them  a  scolding  the  next  morning  for  their 
hesitation,  and  announced  that  the  fact  that  the  moderate 
liberals  favoured  the  Manifesto  was  reason  enough  for  all  friends 
of  the  Government  to  vote  against  it.  Even  the  most  weighty 
official  actions  are  "unpatriotic,"  then,  the  moment  they  serve 
progress.  Has  not  the  reproduction  of  the  official  reports  of 
the  Czar's  own  speeches  been  repeatedly  prohibited  by  thecensor  ? 

With  his  inverted  social  reforms,  his  blood  and  iron,  and  his 
mastery  over  the  national  assembly,  Stolypine  promises  to 
turn  out  a  Russian  Bismarck.  But  what  is  important  is  not 
whether  he  is  a  valuable  servant,  but  whether  he  is  a  loyal 
servant,  of  the  Czar.  That  he  is  loyal  there  can  now  be  little 
question.  This  tells  us  where  he  stands.  It  is  unimportant, 
then,  whether  he  or  the  Czar  is  governing,  whether  he  is  seeking 
to  discover  his  master's  will  or  his  master  is  forcing  his  orders  on 
a  willing  servant.  Well-informed  and  friendly  correspondents 
of  weighty  and  conservative  European  papers  assured  me  last 
summer  that  the  Czar  was  managing  things  himself  or  that 
he  was  superintending  everything,  and  that  Stolypine  lacks  the 
will,  the  ideas,  and  the  statesmanship  to  have  his  way  with  the 
Czar.*  Certain  it  is  that  the  movement  of  the  extreme  reaction- 
aries to  depose  the  prime  minister  has  several  times  made 
considerable  headway.  If  the  Czar  governs  we  know  by  this 
time  how  he  governs.  If  Stolypine  governs  he  does  so,  as  he 
must,  to  please  the  Czar.  A  certain  countess,  with  access  to  the 
court  and  a  leading  woman  in  the  country,  assured  me  later 
that  Stolypine  himself  was  doing  the  work,  even  directing  the 
Czar's  personal  appointees,  the  provincial  governors,  to  whom  he 
has  no  right  to  give  orders,  by  means  of  personal  correspondence. 


*  See  appendix,  Note  D, 


WHAT  HAPPENED  TO  "THE  CONSTITUTION"     99 

It  makes  little  difference  whether  the  supreme  direction  is 
in  the  hands  of  trained  Czars  like  Nicholas,  or  the  trained 
courtiers  of  trained  Czars  like  Minister  Stolypine;  the  court 
and  the  Czarism  remain  unchanged,  and  the  words  of  Prince 
Urussov  received  with  the  prolonged  applause  of  almost  the 
whole  of  the  first  Dtuna  remain  true: 

"The  great  danger  .  .  .  cannot  disappear  as  long  as  the 
direction  of  the  affairs  of  state  and  the  destinies  of  the  coimtry 
remain  under  the  influence  of  men  who  are  marshals  of  the 
court  and  policemen  by  education  and  murderers  by  conviction." 

Equally  true  will  probably  prove  the  words  of  Roditchev 
who  was  suspended  for  them  by  the  present  reactionary  Duma 
after  the  most  dramatic  and  scandalous  scene  of  the  three 
national  assemblies.  Referring  to  the  hangman's  noose  by 
which  Russia  is  governed  to-day,  he  shouted  above  all  the 
clamour  with  which  the  "patriotic"  deputies  sought  to  drown 
his  voice: 

"Yes,  I  say  again,  if  the  Russian  Government  considers  as  the 
only  palladitmi  what  Pureschevitch  called  Muraviev  (the 
recent  minister  of  justice)  collars  and  what  will  be  called  in  the 

future  Stolypine  neckties "     Here  he  was  interrupted  by 

the  tumult.  Stolypine  left  the  minister's  box,  and  Roditchev, 
realising  that  he  had  taken  the  remark  quite  personally,  went 
to  him  to  explain.  He  passed  two  of  Stolypine 's  seconds  who 
had  come  to  demand  an  apology.  But  he  did  not,  as  reported, 
regret  his  words.  And  when  Stolypine  said,  "I  accept  your 
apology,"  Roditchev  answered,  "I  do  not  apologise." 

Expelled  from  the  Duma  Roditchev  became  the  hero  of 
Russia.  His  house  was  filled  with  flowers  and  he  received 
hundreds  of  telegrams  from  all  parts  of  the  country.  Already 
the  overwhelming  majority  of  all  classes  of  the  Russian  people 
except  the  officials  and  nobility  feel  that  Stolypine  governs  by 
the  noose. 


CHAPTER  IX 


PRUSSIAN       REFORM 


GEORGE  III.  of  England  wrote:  "The  times  certainly 
reqiiire  the  concurrence  of  all  those  who  wish  to  prevent 
anarchy.  I  have  no  wish  but  the  prosperity  of  my  own  domin- 
ions, therefore  I  must  look  on  all  those  who  would  not  heartily 
aid  me  not  only  as  bad  subjects  but  as  bad  men." 

So  speaks  in  all  ages  the  easy  conscience  of  the  despot  born 
and  bred.  The  times,  not  despotism,  have  brought  the  anarchy. 
The  despot  born  and  bred,  like  the  slave-owner,  denies  that 
he  could  do  otherwise  than  wish  the  prosperity  of  his  own 
human  property.  Disobedient  subjects  are  bad  men,  criminals, 
or  malefactors.  Those  who  heartily  assist  the  despot  are  not 
courtiers,  flatterers,  self-seekers,  or  petty  tyrants,  but  patriots 
and  the  best  men  of  the  realm.  And  the  prevention  of  anarchy 
and  the  preservation  of  despotism  absorb  nearly  the  whole 
energy  of  the  State. 

To  Greorge  III.  the  anarchists  and  bad  men  were  happily  to  be 
found  for  the  most  part  in  America.  To  Nicholas  II.  most  of 
his  own  Russian  subjects  belong  either  to  a  class  to  be  suspected 
or  to  a  class  to  be  persecuted.  For  him  the  so-called  war  against 
anarchy  and  the  internal  enemy  is  a  war  against  the  over- 
whelming majority  of  the  nation.  The  struggle  of  the 
Czarism  to  preserve  its  existence  is  a  desperate  business. 
One  persecution,  one  arbitrary  act,  necessitates  another, 
until  the  oppression  as  a  whole  assumes  monstrous  and 
finally  ridiculous  proportions.  The  unbiased  foreigner  asks 
perhaps  why  philosophical  books  must  be  censored  or  school- 
children kept  in  jail.  If  the  country  happens  to  be  quiet 
he  does  not  realise  that  a  desperate  and  ceaseless  struggle  is 
going  on,  that  a  few  lenient  measures  have  often  been  enough 
to  allow  a  cumulative,  and  for  a  time  irresistible,  movement 
of  revolt  to  be  set  in  motion.     It  is  precisely  in  the  Czarism *s 

I  CO 


"PRUSSIAN"    REFORM  loi 

I     worst    feature,    its    arbitrariness   and    colossal   violence,   that 

j     it   cannot  reform. 

Indeed  as  the  people  grow  more  intelligent  and  universally 

\]  discontented  the  Government  must  become  more  oppressive 
I  if  it  is  to  preserve  its  existence.  For  instance,  two  lawyers 
have  recently  been  punished,  not  by  the  judges  but  by  the 
political  authorities,  for  the  political  tenor  of  speeches  made 
in  court.  This  is  a  novelty  even  in  Russia.  But  the  reactionary 
organ,  the  Russian  Flag,  reminds  the  complaining  lawyers' 
association  that  the  provincial  governors  can,  like  the  Czar,  do 
absolutely  anything;  that  they  are  appointed  by  the  Czar  and 
have  unlimited  powers.  It  quotes  the  law  to  the  effect  that 
"the  governor,  as  the  responsible  head  of  the  province 
entrusted  to  him  by  the  most  high  will  of  his  Majesty,  is  there 
the  first  protector  of  the  infallibility  of  the  most  high  prerog- 
atives, of  the  autocracy,  of  the  welfare  of  the  State,  etc." 

The  power  of  the  civil  governors  is  disputed.  But  it  cannot 
be  disputed  that  nine-tenths  of  Russia  at  the  present  moment 
has  been  placed  entirely  in  the  power  of  military  governors  and 
satraps  by  explicit  laws  created  to  "prevent  anarchy"  and 
"preserve  the  State."  At  the  same  time  new  civil  laws  are 
constantly  being  drafted,  the  reactionary  Duma  may  lend  its 
aid,  and  in  time  most  of  the  arbitrary  oppression  and  punish- 
ment now  entrusted  to  individuals  or  to  "military  law"  may 
be  classified  and  embodied  in  the  civil  code.  Such  a  "reform" 
would  facilitate  the  preservation  of  order  for  the  officials,  and 
lighten  the  burden  the  loyal  and  privileged  have  to  bear  in 
times  of  "internal  war."  Whether  it  would  lighten  the 
oppression  can  be  questioned.  Under  the  present  disorder  some 
officials  entrusted  with  irresponsible  power  are  worse  than  any 
law,  but  just  as  many  are  more  humane  than  the  statutes.  ^ 
The  one  reform  on  which  all  officials,  courtiers,  and  reaction-  1 

/aries  are  agreed  is  that  the  nation  shall  be  forced  into  order 
(  and  tranquillity.  But  here  the  harmony  comes  to  an  en^ 
Shall  the  new  order  be  an  "autocratic"  or  a  "legal"  order? 
The  extreme  reactionaries  cannot  see  how  an  unlimited  ruler 
can  be  bound  by  any  laws.  All  their  "reforms"  propose 
rather  to  increase  his  personal  power.  They  are  opposed  on 
abstract  grounds  to  the  bureaucracy  and  in  order  to  control 


I02  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

it  they  want  the  Czar  to  institute  a  new  supreme  court  governed 
by  no  law  but  his  personal  wishes.  It  is  certain  that  every 
tradition  of  the  Czarism  is  on  their  side. 

For  years  every  great  new  problem  that  has  arisen  has  been 
solved,  not  by  an  extension  of  the  law,  but  by  lending  to  some 
newly  created  class  of  officials  a  part  of  the  Czar's  arbitrary 
power.  When  a  few  years  ago,  in  response  to  the  landlords' 
complaints  that  they  could  not  bring  their  tenants  and 
labourers  to  terms,  the  local  "land  officials"  were  created,  they 
were  subordinated  not  to  higher  local  officials  but  to  a  St. 
Petersburg  ministry  more  subject  to  the  immediate  dictates  of 
the  Czar.  But  this  was  not  enough  for  Nicholas.  The  minis- 
tries are  after  all  bureaus  subject  to  laws,  while  the  provincial 
governors  are,  as  we  have  seen,  the  Czar's  personal  lieutenants. 
So  Nicholas  asked  Prince  Urussov  whether  he  did  not  think  it 
would  be  a  great  reform  to  subordinate  the  land  officials  directly 
to  the  provincial  governors  and  so  withdraw  them  entirely  from 
the  ordinary  laws,  and  he  was  most  displeased  with  Urussov 's 
negative  answer. 

Of  course,  legal  order,  organisation,  and  system  must  be 
.extended  in  Russia  since  it  is  a  semi-modem  State.  In  its 
enormous  business  enterprises,  for  instance,  personal  rule 
is  unthinkable,  and  the  State  must  be  more  or  less  modern  in 
its  methods.  But  the  Russian  Government  has  peculiar 
functions  of  persecution  that  can  never  be  quite  classified, 
ordered,  or  brought  under  the  law.  Such  activities  will  be 
administered  as  before.  Legal  order  based  on  violence  will 
extend  itself  in  some  departments,  but  alongside  it  will  grow 
the  present  order  of  sheer  despotism,  the  brutal  annihilation  of 
all  opposition  to  the  ruling  class  through  the  gallows,  prisons, 
mines,  exile,  and  the  knout. 

This  is  a  time  as  never  before  in  Russian  history  of  official 
talk  of  reform,  and  that  there  will  be  reform  among  the  officials 
we  make  no  question.  The  Czarism  must  reform  its  human 
mechanism  or  of  its  own  accord  disintegrate.  The  corruption 
of  the  Russian  officials  is  notorious  the  world  over  and  was 
perhaps  never  worse  than  to-day  after  the  recent  wars  against 
Japan  and  the  "internal  enemies."  Less  known  are  the  discord, 
jealousy  and  hatred  that  prevail  among  the  innumerable  bureaus 


"PRUSSIAN"   REFORM  103 

and  the  various  ranks  of  officials  within  them;  the  generation- 
long  delays  in  the  most  fundamental  reforms,  the  arbitrary- 
manner  in  which  nearly  every  official  fulfills  his  functions.  That 
all  this  will  be  much  improved  with  the  aid  of  the  new  Duma, 
interested  in  such  administrative  improvements,  to  the  exclusion 
of  all  social  reform,  there  is  little  doubt.  If  administrative 
improvements  are  not  made  and  made  quickly  the  Government 
will  not  even  make  a  temporary  headway  against  the  revolution. 
Even  a  part  of  its  present  allies,  including  a  large  part  of  the 
lower  and  even  a  part  of  the  higher  officials,  will  join  the  revolt. 
Already  recent  ministers  and  generals  of  the  staff  have  gone  over 
to  the  almost  revolutionary  opposition,  a  large  majority  of  the 
railway,  post-office,  and  telegraph  employees  of  all  classes 
joined  the  revolutionary  general  strike  two  years  ago,  and 
several  hundred  army  officers  are  members  of  the  revolutionary 
organisations.  Policemen  have  struck,  officials  of  all  classes 
have  aided  the  moderate  opposition,  a  large  part  of  the  village 
clergy  has  become  liberal,  and  judges  have  become  lenient; 
Stolypine  had  to  devote  half  his  declaration  to  the  third  Duma 
to  threats  against  officials  that  aided  the  opposition  parties, 
however  moderate,  though  he  could  not  deny  that  all,  from 
highest  to  lowest,  are  encouraged  to  join  the  extreme  reactionary 
organisations  that  openly  oppose  the  ministers  as  not  being 
sufficiently  reactionary.  The  officials  must  be  reformed  if  the 
Government  is  not  to  be  crippled  by  internal  dissensions  or 
lose  its  own  employees  to  the  revolutionary  cause.  Indeed  the 
bureaucracy  must  be  regenerated  if  even  those  measures  that 
the  Government  itself  considers  most  necessary  are  ever  to  be 
put  into  execution.* 

The  big  business  interests  are  now  well  represented  in  the 
new  Duma,  which  includes  not  only  merchants  and  capitalists 
but  many  landlords  who  exploit  their  lands  in  a  business  way, 
and  the  disorganisation  and  robberies  have  reached  the  limit 
of  the  bearable  for  any  business  interest.  The  railways,  the 
banks,  the  coal  mines,  are  crippled  for  lack  of  effective  control, 
and  the  Duma  will  not  hesitate  to  use  effectively  its  sole  power, 
that  of  inspection  and  exposure,  a  power  sufficient  to  this  end. 

It  will  never  be  known  which  of  the  losses  in  the  recent  war 

•  See  Appendix,  Note  E. 


I04  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

were  due  to  thieving  officials  and  which  to  the  real  superiority 
of  the  Japanese.  It  is  known  that  the  supplies  for  the  Red 
Cross  were  pilfered,  that  a  thousand  carloads  of  coal  vanished 
so  completely  that  an  investigating  committee  was  unable  to 
say  when  they  disappeared,  and  that  the  Czar  wrote  in  his  own 
hand  "poor  fellows"  on  the  report  telling  how  soldiers  had  had 
their  feet  frozen  from  boots  that  wore  out  after  a  few  days  of 
service.  It  was  not  that  this  could  be  done  only  under  cover 
of  the  excitement  of  the  war.  After  the  war  was  over  the 
Government  declared  that  Russia  must  learn  from  her  defeat 
that  a  new  and  better  army  and  navy  must  be  created  and  that 
better  fortune  awaited  her.  As  a  step  toward  the  new  navy 
it  was  decided  to  build  seven  gun-boats  in  the  Far  East  on  the 
River  Amur.  They  were  nearly  completed  and  an  inspector 
was  just  about  to  arrive  when  a  fire  destroyed  them.  The 
Russian  press  claims  they  were  burned  by  the  order  of  officials 
who  had  stolen  a  part  of  the  money  assigned  to  their  construction. 
Why  should  we  not  believe  it?  Has  not  a  recent  minister  just 
been  convicted  of  having  handed  over  an  enormous  contract 
for  supplying  grain  to  starving  peasants  to  a  stranger  whom 
he  had  met  through  a  woman  of  doubtful  character?  The  grain 
was  of  course  not  delivered,  and  thousands  of  peasants  starved. 
The  criminal,  Lidval,  was  let  out  of  jail  before  he  had  been  there 
a  few  months,  the  minister,  Gurko,  was  dismissed  from  office 
but  given  no  punishment. 

It  is  not  likely  that  this  corruption  will  continue  as  it  has 
been,  nor  is  it  likely  that  the  old  type  of  arbitrary  official  will 
always  be  tolerated.  Like  the  Prussians,  it  is  probable  that 
Government  servants  of  the  future  will  be  held  more  strictly  to 
the  line  of  their  duty  and  the  letter  of  the  law.  Here  is  a 
typical  case  of  what  has  been  happening.  Prince  Gortsch- 
akov,  Governor  of  Viatka,  went  off  for  a  three  days'  hunt  on 
the  estate  of  a  rich  merchant.  He  did  not  turn  over  his  "unlim- 
ited" powers  to  his  lieutenant,  as  is  required  on  such  occasions. 
An  order  came  from  St.  Petersburg  declaring  martial  law  in  one 
of  the  districts  of  the  province.  Nothing  cotdd  be  done, 
however,  in  this  apparently  critical  situation  until  the  prince 
returned.  When  he  did  so,  instead  of  issmng  special  manifestoes 
to  the  population  of  the  disturbed  district,  he  decided  to  turn 


"PRUSSIAN"   REFORM  105 

it  over  to  the  mercies  of  a  young  officer  friend  named  De  Roche- 
fort  who  was  Hving  in  his  house  and  whom  he  had  brought  with 
him  to  Viatka.  This  young  official,  though  of  high  rank,  was  not 
on  duty,  perhaps  on  account  of  his  notorious  habits  or  his 
publication  of  a  reactionary  pamphlet  against  the  Government. 
But  still  he  was  made  czar  of  the  disturbed  district  of  Sarapul. 
Hereupon,  though  the  elections  were  just  beginning,  the  cholera 
breaking  out,  and  this  district  was  under  martial  law,  the  prince 
went  off  again  officially  for  an  inspection,  but  unofficially  for 
another  hunt,  and  for  the  journey  advanced  himself  1,000 
rubles  from  the  Government's  funds. 

In  Prussia  such  idle  nobleman  administrators  are  not  tol- 
erated. If  Stolypine  has  a  tithe  of  the  force  of  Bismarck  and 
the  new  Duma  the  "loyalty"  of  the  Prussian  Landtag,  a  few 
years  will  work  great  changes  in  the  whole  governmental  machine. 
From  the  uncertain  engine  of  oppression  that  it  now  is,  it  will 
become  the  admirable,  smooth- working,  soul-crushing  instru- 
ment that  is  the  Prussian  bureaucracy  of  the  present  moment. 
The  wildness  as  well  as  the  htunanity  may  largely  disappear, 
but  the  result  will  be  the  impressive  but  highly  deceptive 
efficiency  of  the  Prussian  btireaucrat.  For  the  Prussians 
have  certainly  created  a  "legal"  order,  but  they  have  as  far 
as  they  were  able  annihilated  individual  initiative,  hardened 
the  lines  of  caste,  and  done  all  in  their  power  to  drill  into  htunble 
and  terror-stricken  privates  all  the  citizens  of  the  country. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  that  Stolypine  and  the  majority 
of  the  third  Dtrnia  envy  and  emulate  in  almost  every  particular 
the  perfected  absolutism  and  bureaucracy  of  Prussia.  As  in 
Prussia,  they  want  a  "legal"  rather  than  a  "constitutional" 
monarchy,  a  gradual  increase  of  civil  but  not  of  political  rights, 
a  regenerated  State  rather  than  a  regenerated  people.  How 
could  it  be  otherwise  ?  Prussia  has,  like  Russia,  a  bureaucratic 
absolutism,  a  militarism,  a  State  that  can  rely  on  the  zealous 
loyalty  only  of  its  landlord  nobility.  Austria  has  been,  and 
Hungary  is  still,  not  dissimilar.  The  ciu-se  of  Russia  lies  not 
in  any  institutions  peculiarly  Russian,  but  in  the  fact  that  the 
pe  jple  have  not  yet  won  their  freedom  by  fighting  for  it.  In  all 
the  eastern  half  of  Europe  —  Prussia,  Saxony,  Austria,  Hungary, 
and  Roumania — elements  of  the  same  evils  that  are  seen  in 


io6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Russia  are  still  prominent.  France  and  England  have  had 
their  revolutions  and  are  politically  free.  In  these  other 
countries  the  people  have  been  beaten  and  have  just  such  freedom 
as  corresponds  to  the  interests  of  the  ruling  class. 

A  larger  part  of  the  Russian  practices  that  shock  Englishmen 
and  Americans  as  outrages,  glaring  there  because  vigorously- 
resisted  by  the  nation,  are  but  better  disguised  commonplaces 
in  Germany,  carried  out  under  the  forms  of  law  and  accepted 
by  a  people  that  has  no  hope  whatever  of  immediately  overthrow- 
ing the  Government.  The  Prussian  Landtag  is,  like  the  Russian 
Duma,  composed  of  officials,  landlords,  and  the  privileged  classes, 
but  the  proportions  are  still  higher  than  in  Russia,  for  there  are 
no  Socialists  and  only  a  handful  of  opponents  to  the  Government ; 
while  in  Russia  there  are  fifteen  Socialist  deputies  and  the 
opposition  numbers  about  one  hundred  and  fifty,  or  one-third  in 
the  Duma.  The  police  terrorise  the  voters  in  Russia,  but  in 
Prussia  this  is  not  necessary;  the  voting  is  public,  and  the 
"disloyal"  voter  is  black-listed  by  the  landlords  and  the 
Government.  Indeed  the  radicals  of  Prussia  are  now  agitating 
for  the  secret  ballot  that  Russia  has  already  adopted. 

We  forget  that  Prussia  is  an  absolutism  as  much  as  Russia, 
and  that  the  King  of  Prussia  even  refused  the  crown  of  the 
German  Empire  in  1849  solely  because  it  was  offered  to  him 
by  a  constitutional  assembly  and  not  by  the  kings,  his  equals. 
We  forget  the  boundless  Prussian  reaction  of  1849,  ^.nd  that 
"the  rights  of  man"  are  not  even  guaranteed  by  the  present 
constitution  of  the  whole  German  Empire.  We  look  at  Prussia 
as  a  modern  State  because  her  people  are  so  clearly  a  modem 
people,  at  least  in  part.  We  forget  that  politically  the  Prus- 
sians have  been  able  to  make  almost  no  progress  against  their 
Government  since  1848,  and  that  there  is  actual  retrogression 
in  such  vital  matters  as  the  schools,  the  very  basis  of  Prussia's 
reputation  as  a  modem  government  —  to  say  nothing  of  the 
antiquated  relations  between  church  and  State  and  the  handing 
over  of  many  local  governments  to  the  nobility. 

It  is  preeminently  natural,  if  not  inevitable,  in  a  country 
ridden  by  an  absolute  monarch,  his  army,  officials,  nobility, 
and  church,  that  the  people's  schools  should  be  neglected. 
The  official  organ  of  the  Russian  Government  finds  that  a  slight 


"PRUSSIAN"  REFORM  107 

increase  of  7,000,000  rubles  expenditure  for  the  nation's 
schools  would  be  a  "luxury."  The  Russian  budget  is 
2,500,000,000  rubles.  Four  hundred  or  five  hundred  million  go 
every  year  to  the  army  and  navy,  and  this  year  the  amount 
will  probably  be  raised  forty  or  fifty  million  rubles.  The 
schools  are  getting  in  many  places  one-tenth  of  what  they  do  in 
the  United  States,  and  yet  an  increase  of  twenty  or  thirty 
cents  a  head  for  the  children  of  the  people  is  a  "luxury." 
There  have  been  years  when  the  increased  expenditure  of 
the  backward  schools  of  New  York  City  has  been  as  great. 

But  this  is  not  a  Russian  phenomenon;  it  is  a  normal  result 
of  absolutism.  In  proportion  to  her  greater  wealth  and  better 
organisation,  the  Prussian  schools  are  better.  Prussia  also 
enjoyed  a  generation  ago  some  sweeping  school  reforms,  under 
the  able  Minister  Studt.  But  this  was  at  the  time  of  the  victori- 
ous wars  with  Austria  and  France,  that  seemed  to  give  a  raison 
d'etre  to  absolutism  and  reanimated  all  its  branches.  Since 
1 87 1  there  have  been  no  wars,  and  the  degeneration  soon  set 
in;  the  common  schools  stood  almost  still  while  the  country 
moved  forward,  until  now  an  incredible  low  level  prevails. 
We  can  not  dilate  upon  the  antiquated  teaching  of  the  one- 
sided religious  instruction,  the  orders  to  teach  the  splendid 
achievements  of  the  HohenzoUerns  "in  every  branch  of  civili- 
sation," the  condemnation  of  all  revolt  and  the  glorification  of 
war.  But  we  can  point  out  that  outside  of  the  large  cities,  where 
wealth  and  public  opinion  have  brought  some  improvements, 
there  are  sixty-three  to  seventy-four  pupils  to  a  single  teacher 
and  the  expenditure  per  pupil  is  from  thirty-five  to  forty- 
eight  marks;  the  better  schools  of  America  expend  this  much 
in  dollars,  so  four  times  as  much  — ■  for  it  must  be  remembered 
that  in  the  present  high-taxed  Germany  a  mark  buys  no  more 
than  a  quarter  of  a  dollar  in  the  United  States.  There  are 
ten  thousand  half-day  schools,  many  teachers  have  even  three 
sets  of  children  a  day,  or  as  many  children  as  two  hundred. 
Three  thousand  schools  are  without  teachers,  either,  as  in 
Russia,  because  of  their  liberal  opinions,  or  because  of  the  nig- 
gardliness of  the  landlords  who  control  the  schools.  It  seems 
that  these  latter  need  the  children  in  the  fields,  and  to  secure  the 
children's  labour,   often   declare   holidays  of  several  days  or 


io8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

weeks.  Recently  a  teacher  who  protested  was  removed  and  a 
preacher  that  supported  him  given  a  good  scolding  for  resistance 
to  his  superiors. 

This  is  what  Russia  may  hope  to  rise  to  in  her  present 
course.  For  a  change  to  Prussia's  condition  would  be  a  rise, 
since  after  all  only  a  small  per  cent,  of  the  Prussians  remain 
without  some  education,  miserable  as  it  is.  Further  Russia 
will  scarcely  go  until  the  people  have  captured  some  share  in  the 
Government.  With  an  election  law  like  Russia's  or  Prussia's, 
there  is  even  a  likelihood  that  the  weak  national  assembly  will 
degenerate  into  a  more  and  more  servile  tool  of  the  Emperor 
and  officials.  The  Prussian  Landtag  is  much  more  backward 
than  it  was  sixty  years  ago.  Of  over  four  hundred  members 
i6i  are  landlords,  iii  officials,  and  more  than  a  hundred  others 
represent  the  wealthy  classes.  It  is  thus  not  necessary  for  the 
Prussian  Government  to  consult  the  common  people  either  of 
the  towns  or  of  the  country,  nor  any  part  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  towns.  The  Russian  Duma  is  not  yet  so  bad,  but 
the  pressure  of  the  Government  on  its  dependents  and  the 
interference  of  the  police  may  even  bring  about,  after  the  coming 
elections,  a  less  representative  assembly  than  the  Landtag. 

Indeed  the  analogy  with  Prussia  is  almost  indispensable 
for  an  understanding  of  the  present  Russian  Government.  Of 
course  Prussia  does  not  as  a  rule  tolerate  the  wildest  reaction- 
aries as  Russia  does,  yet  we  have  the  notorious  Count  Pickler 
going  about  for  years  unpunished  and  preaching  that  the  day 
would  come  when  the  Germans  would  have  to  massacre  the  Jews. 
Even  when  he  was  finally  arrested  "in  the  fortress"  he  was 
allowed  a  leave  in  which  he  went  home  to  his  estate  to  drill 
the  peasant  troops  he  was  preparing  for  the  coming  event. 
Fortunately  for  the  Government,  the  insanity  of  the  count  has 
just  relieved  it  from  its  embarrassing  predicament. 

The  similarity  between  the  two  neighbouring  governments 
is  more  than  an  analogy ;  it  is  due  to  common  causes,  a  largely 
common  history,  and  parallel  development.  For  instance,, 
the  Czars  of  Russia  are  very  much  more  German  than  Russian, 
and  this  has  been  the  case  for  two  centuries.  Of  a  hundred 
of  the  present  Czar's  ancestors  scarcely  ten  are  of  Russian 
blood  and  education;  nearly  all  the  rest  are  German.     Indeed 


"PRUSSIAN"   REFORM  109 

Catherine  II.  and  several  other  Russian  monarchs  have  been 
wholly  German.  The  nobility  and  the  bureaucracy  are  also 
largely  German.  Of  a  recent  cabinet  six  members,  or  about 
half,  bore  German  names ;  of  fifty-three  members  of  the  Council 
of  State  eighteen  were  Russian  Germans;  of  forty -six  members 
of  the  first  department  of  the  Senate  twelve  were  German; 
among  noted  generals  are  Kleigels,  Kaulbars,  Rennenkampf, 
Neidhardt,  Miiller-Zakomelski,  and  Bauer;  of  recent  prime 
ministers  von  Plehve  and  Witte  were  German ;  of  the  chief 
organisers  of  the  massacres  nearly  half  bear  German  names. 
Of  course  these  are  all  Russianised  Germans,  but  at  the  same 
time  they  come  for  the  most  part  from  the  Baltic  Provinces  where 
they  preserve  their  German  culture  and  are  in  constant  and 
intimate  relations  with  their  Prussian  neighbours,  only  a  few 
hours  away.  Very  many  have  much  Russian  blood,  but  very 
many  noblemen  and  high  officials  bearing  Russian  names  are 
largely  German.  The  truth,  more  accurately  expressed,  is 
that  the  highest  Russian  nobility  and  bureaucracy  owes  a 
third  or  fourth  of  its  blood  and  traditions  to  the  Germans. 

The  bureaucracy  and  military  are  not  only  inspired  by  their 
own  German  tradition,  but  are  consciously  modelled  and 
remodelled  on  the  German  example.  Sometimes  the  process 
has  been  reversed.  Doubtless  Peter  the  Great  was  something  of 
an  inspiration  to  Frederick,  and  Nicholas  I.  to  Wilhelm  I. 
The  chief  influence  of  Russia  on  Prussia  has  been  as  a  possible 
enemy,  a  bogy  to  frighten  the  Prussians  into  militarism  and 
subjection.  But  Prussia,  in  this  exchange,  has  given  more 
than  she  has  received.  Peter's  bureaucrats  were  mostly  Germans 
and,  in  the  later  reigns,  the  proportion  was  even  increased. 

The  evolution  of  Russia  in  the  last  generation  and  at  the 
present  time,  so  incomprehensible  to  the  English,  French,  or 
Americans,  seems  like  an  old  story  to  the  educated  Prussian. 
^  The  serfs  were  emancipated  in  Prussia  from  1808  to  1848,  in 
'  Russia  in  1 86 1 ;  in  both  countries  the  conditions  before  and  after 
the  emancipation  were  remarkably  similar.  Both  were  military 
and  bureaucratic  absolutisms,  in  both  society  was  divided  by 
the  law  into  nobles,  peasants  and  citizens,  and  all  the  military 
and  important  civil  posts  went  to  the  nobles. 

In  both  countries  the  reforms  came  not  as  a  social  regeneration 


no  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

from  below,  but  as  measures  to  save  the  State  from  disintegration 
after  disastrous  wars  —  in  Prussia  those  against  Napoleon,  in 
Russia  the  Crimean  war.  "The  idea"  (in  Prussia),  says  Seig- 
nabos,  "was  not  to  better  the  condition  of  the  people  but  to 
rescue  the  State  from  ruin."  Count  Hardenberg  said,  "We 
wish  to  establish  a  monarchical  government  without  democratic 
principles."  His  wish  was  accomplished  and  his  entirely 
undemocratic  State  remains  to  this  day  intact. 

After,  as  before  the  emancipations  in  both  countries,  the 
peasants  remained  for  a  generation  or  more  under  the  police 
and  judicial  administration  of  their  former  owners  and  were 
still  subjected  to  corporal  punishment.  In  both  countries  the 
peasants  had  to  pay  extortionary  and  impossible  prices  both  for 
their  freedom  and  the  tiny  parcels  of  land  that  were  left  them. 
In  both  they  lost  their  rights  of  access  to  the  forests  and  part 
of  their  common  pasture,  and  held  their  property  on  such 
precarious  titles  that  the  landlords  in  control  of  the  courts  were 
often  enabled  to  steal  it  from  them.  Until  1891,  eighty  years 
after  the  emancipation  was  begun  in  Prussia,  old  land  laws 
were  still  in  force,  and  the  proprietors  were  favoured  not  only 
by  the  courts  but  by  the  letter  of  the  law.  And  it  was  not  till 
the  same  date  that  the  local  government  was  taken  away  from 
the  landlords,  only  to  be  placed  in  the  hands  of  a  bureaucracy 
which  was,  as  I  have  shown,  almost  entirely  in  their  control. 
This  is  what  may  be  expected  to  happen  in  Russia  to  the 
proposed  local  government  reforms. 

In  Prussia,  as  in  Russia,  the  Government's  borrowing 
operations  were  long  kept  secret,  and  a  representation  of  the 
people  was  long  promised  but  never  granted.  In  both  countries 
it  took  a  tremendous  struggle  to  secure  the  concession  that 
the  national  assembly,  such  as  it  is,  should  be  called  periodically 
and  not  merely  at  the  will  of  the  ruler,  and  that  new  taxes  at 
least  must  be  voted  by  this  body.  But  in  both  countries  the 
budget  is  often  voted  after  the  money  is  already  expended,  and 
neither  Bismarck  nor  Stolypine  ever  hesitated  to  go  right  on 
with  their  expenditures  when  the  national  assemblies  were 
opposed.  Finally,  in  both  countries  the  ruler  appoints  the 
upper  chamber,  controls  alone  the  army  and  foreign  relations, 
appoints  all  officials  and  reserves  an  absolute  veto  over  all  laws. 


; 


"PRUSSIAN"   REFORM  iii 

Russia  and  Prussia,  and  even  the  whole  German  Empire, 
are  unconstitutional  governments  — if  for  no  other  reason  than 
for  this:  When  a  contingency  arises  that  the  constitution  (so- 
called)  does  not  provide  for,  the  old  laws  hold.  But  the  old 
laws  were  those  of  absolutism.  It  is  because  they  recognise 
the  fact  that  the  Kaiser  has  the  power  in  the  last  resort  that  the 
opposition  parties  are  so  timid,  and  that  the  most  the  majority 
of  them  claim  is  merely  that  the  people  have  certain  rights 
alongside  the  equal  rights  of  the  Crown.  This  is  why  local  reforms 
are  arrested,  the  schools  stand  still,  the  dignity  of  man  is  crushed 
under  an  iron  heel,  and  Germany  is  threatened  every  moment 
with  monstrous  war. 

The  condition  in  Russia  is  and  must  remain  similar  until 
there  is  a  revolutionary  upheaval  from  below.  But  in  the 
meanwhile  there  are  two  great  differences  between  the  two 
countries.  Stolypine  has  provided  such  a  reactionary  election 
law  that  he  may  not  have  to  repeat  his  recent  coup  d'etatsind 
call  a  Duma  more  friendly  to  the  Government  than  the  present 
one.  In  that  case  he  will  not  have  to  perform  Bismarck's 
act  of  trampling  on  the  constitution.     He  can  ignore  it. 

At  the  same  time  Stolypine  has  a  vast  disadvantage  com- 
pared to  Bismarck,  He  has  no  chance  to  wage  war,  fuse  Russia 
together  with  blood  and  iron,  and  crush  all  opposition  with 
renewed  and  victorious  arms.  Russia  is  not  a  small  and  de- 
fenceless country  like  Prussia  was.  Her  peasants  are  not  war- 
like; they  are  revolutionary.  Absolutisms  arise  from  and  are 
nourished  by  war.  And  without  wars  all  absolutisms  will 
perish.  With  no  prospect  of  patriotic  bloodshed  the  doom  of 
the  Czarism  is  sealed. 


CHAPTER   X 


AUTOCRACY  S    LAST    HOPE 


THE  problem  before  Nicholas  II.,  an  ordinary  man  and  an 
ordinary  Czar,  remains  after  the  lapse  of  two  centuries 
the  same  as  the  problem  before  the  Czar-genius  Peter  the  Great. 
It  is  an  insoluble  problem.  The  desire  of  the  Czars  at  their 
best  is  to  develop  the  people  without  giving  up  to  them  any  of 
the  autocratic  power.  The  result  is  not  mere  paternalism,  but 
a  withering  benevolent  despotism  that  defeats  even  its  own 
object. 

Peter's  system  was  to  create  governmental  institutions  and 
electoral  bodies  in  a  country  where  systematic  organisation 
and  the  regular  participation  of  any  class  of  people  in  the 
Government  were  almost  unknown.  And,  indeed,  the  people  were 
forced  for  the  first  time,  rather  arbitrarily  to  be  sure,  to  think 
about  the  best  form  of  organisation  of  the  country,  to  feel 
deeply  over  real  questions  of  state.  The  policy  of  the  first  ten 
years  of  Nicholas's  reign  forms  a  striking  parallel.  Nicholas 
is  not  a  genius,  but  perhaps  Witte  is.  This  is  a  business  or 
economic  age.  It  is  not  then  merely  political  institutions 
that  Witte  has  created,  but  railways,  manufactiires,  gold 
currency,  an  enormous  liquor  monopoly,  and  banks.  It  is 
not  of  political  questions  that  the  people  have  been  forced 
to  think  and  feel,  but  of  the  great  economic  questions  of 
modern  life. 

But  the  parallel  holds  good.  "Peter  was  possessed  by  the 
abstract  idea  of  state,"  says  the  Russian  historian,  "the  people 
were  only  ciphers  in  the  total."  But  the  people  could  be 
forced  into  ciphers  only  by  whips  and  the  sword.  Peter  insti- 
tuted for  the  first  time  an  elaborate  system  of  espionage,  revived 
many  of  the  tortures  of  Ivan  the  Terrible,  and  still  failed.  His 
great  state  machine  became  a  Frankenstein  and  threatened  its 
creator's    existence.     His    new    bureaucracy    became    corrupt 

112 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  113 

and  rotten  with  bribery,  and  came  to  be  an  additional  burden 
on  the  state. 

Witte  is  possessed  by  the  idea  of  the  state  as  the  universal 
capitalist,  as  the  great  owner,  manufacturer,  banker,  and 
employer.  His  is  a  state  socialism  beyond  the  dreams  of 
Bismarck.  If  the  Russian  Government  were  to  continue 
to  absorb  private  capital  at  the  rate  it  did  in  the  ten  years 
of  Witte 's  reign  over  Russian  finance,  half  a  century  would 
develop  a  perfected  state  capitalism  (a  more  accurate  term 
than  state  socialism)  and  the  monopoly  of  industry  and  bank- 
ing by  the  Government.  To  accomplish  his  reforms  Witte 
did  not  have  to  resort  to  whips  and  the  sword  like  Peter.  As 
long  as  the  instruments  of  violence  could  preserve  the  Czarism 
from  revolution,  Witte  had  no  need  of  their  direct  use  for  his 
reforms.  Quite  the  contrary,  where  they  were  in  use  he  often 
had  them  abolished  and  replaced  by  more  modern  instruments. 
Starvation  of  the  people  is,  as  I  shall  show,  literally  the  founda- 
tion of  Witte's  reforms.  But  actual  starvation  is  unable  to  bring 
about  the  permanent  economic  prosperity  of  any  community. 
It  cannot  be  said  that  Witte 's  plan  has  failed,  for  it  is  still  in 
practice.  But  it  must  lead  to  the  greatest  economic  cataclysm 
the  world  has  seen. 

Peter's  whole  system,  says  Kostomarov,  was  directed  against 
the  prevailing  want  of  public  spirit,  the  lack  of  independence 
of  action,  the  absence  of  initiative  capacity.  Mentioning  his 
proposed  reforms  and  the  Czar's  October  Manifesto,  Witte 
says  in  the  budget  of  1906:  "The  steady  growth  of  the  con- 
sciousness of  the  masses  will  undoubtedly  soon  lead  them 
to  true  comprehension  of  economic  progress,  and  arouse  in 
them  a  desire  for  real  improvement  of  national  well-being.  A 
sure  pledge  of  the  awakening  of  public  life  is  Your  Majesty's  call 
to  the  nation  to  enter  the  path  of  independent  action,  and  also 
the  equality  before  the  law  granted  to  all  Your  Majesty's  sub- 
jects." After  the  lapse  of  two  centuries  Russia's  statesmen 
are  still  trying  to  inoculate  her  Czar-cursed  people  with  initia- 
tive, independence,  and  public  spirit. 

That  Witte  failed  as  Peter  did  is  due  not  entirely  to  himself. 
The  proposed  equality  before  the  law  and  the  popular  assembly 
for  which  he  finally  obtained  the  Czar's  promise  against  all  the 


114  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

nobility  and  the  court,  have  now  been  definitely  abandoned. 

If  Witte  could  have  spoken  more  openly  perhaps  he  would  have 

deplored  not  the  lack  of  desire,  but  the  lack  of  hope,  for  real 

improvement  among  the  masses  of  the  people.     But  Witte 's 

error  lay  not  so  much  in  a  too  loyal  hopefulness  and  confidence 

in  the  false  Nicholas,  or  in  a  too  bureaucratic  contempt  for  the 

people,  as  in  a  fundamental  misconception  of  his  own  business, 

finance.     It  is  he  that  has  the  lack  of  true  comprehension  of 

economic  progress  of  which  he  accuses  the  Russian  people. 

Peter  could  not,  says  Kostomarov,  "inoculate  civic  courage, 

'    the  feeling  of  duty,  or  love  of  one's  neighbour,"  he  could  not  create 

a  new  and  living  Russia  by  means  of  violence.     Witte  could  not 

♦    inoculate    initiative,  independence,    and    public  spirit  on  the 

^    basis  of  the  starvation  of  the  peasants,  which  is  the  basis  of 

his  conception  of  economic  progress. 

Peter  the  Great  laid  the  foundations  of  the  modem  absolutism ; 
Witte  has  set  it  on  the  road  of  its  last  hope.  Perhaps  Witte 
at  the  last  was  even  conscious  of  the  desperate  character  of  his 
experiment,  of  the  need  of  compromising  with  democracy,  the 
arch-enemy.  It  was  no  accident,  however,  that  the  road  of 
state  socialism  was  chosen.  If  Witte  had  not  been  there, 
another  man  or  other  men  would  have  assumed  his  burden,  and 
the  same  results  would  have  been  reached,  perhaps  with  the 
loss  of  a  few  years,  or  a  few  billion  rubles  to  the  Russian  state. 
The  reason  for  choosing  this  road  is  not  far  to  seek  —  the  neces- 
sities of  war;  a  reason  fearfully  painful  to  consider,  for  poor, 
starving,  Czar-cursed  Russia  is,  after  all,  part  and  parcel  of  the 
great  modem  world,  flesh  of  our  flesh  and  bone  of  our  bone. 

Russia  is  part  and  parcel  of  the  modem  world  if  for  no  other 
reason  because  she  must  defend  herself  against  it.  She  is  our 
neighbour,  she  controls  a  fourth  of  the  best  cultivable  land  of 
the  earth,  her  people  are  of  our  own  white  race  and  of  the  same 
religions  as  ourselves.  Even  at  the  time  of  Peter  the  Great 
she  had  already  decided  to  utilise  all  the  machinery  of  modem 
industry  that  does  so  much  to  make  our  life  what  it  is.  Besides, 
millions  of  her  people  have  all  our  modem  culture,  and  half  the 
rising  generation  can  read  and  write.  Why  do  we  forget  all 
these  obvious  facts  and  try  to  judge  Russia  as  a  thing  apart? 
Even  Japan  and  Turkey  are  dragged  into  the  circle  of  modem 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  115 

civilisation,  above  all  by  the  necessity  of  defending  themselves 
by  modem  means.  It  was  especially  by  the  necessities  of  war 
that  the  Czars  have  been  compelled  to  keep  step  with  many 
modem  ideas,  and  it  was  the  absolute  need  of  getting  money 
to  support  her  enormous  armies  and  costly  fleets  that  inevitably 
forced  Alexander  II.  to  abolish  slavery  and  his  son  Alexander  III. 
to  call  a  modem  financier  like  Witte  into  power.  It  was  like- 
wise inevitable  in  a  country  where  all  the  power  rests  with  the 
Government,  that  Witte  in  strengthening  capitalism  should  seek 
to  establish  State  capitalism,  just  as  Alexander  II.  in  abolishing 
the  slavery  of  the  agriculturists  to  the  landlords,  should 
establish  instead  a  slavery  to  the  State. 

The  crushing  defeat  of  Russia  by  France  and  England  in  the 
Crimean  War  necessitated  revolutionary  changes  in  the  Russian 
army  if  the  country  were  to  preserve  its  independence.  The 
professional  army  of  military  slaves  forced  to  twenty-five  years 
of  service,  had  to  be  replaced  by  the  much  larger  modem  army 
of  all  the  young  men  of  the  nation  enlisted  for  a  few  years  and 
trained  by  a  certain  "patriotism"  as  much  as  by  fear.  The 
peasants,  breaking  out  more  and  more  in  revolt,  had  to  be  made 
over  not  only  into  loyal  but  into  zealous  subjects.  War  rail- 
roads had  to  be  built,  and  a  new  fleet  and  modem  armament 
were  indispensable.  At  least  there  had  to  be  enough  clothes  to 
keep  the  soldiers  from  freezing,  as  happened  so  frequently  in 
that  war;  there  had  to  be  medical  attendance  for  the  sick  and 
wounded,  the  miserable  lack  of  which  had  caused  more  losses 
than  the  enemies*  bullets;  and  enough  powder,  also  lacking, 
for  the  cannons  and  guns.  But  the  country  could  pay  no  more 
even  for  these  important  purposes.  The  serfs  had  to  be  liberated 
then  and  modem  railroads  and  industry  introduced,  or  the 
country  would  be  divided  up  by  the  foreign  powers.  It  was 
not  an  internal  situation  that  abolished  serfdom  and  moved 
Russia  once  more  into  modem  Europe,  but  the  imperative 
necessity  of  keeping  up  with  her  neighbours  or  belonging  to 
them. 

Modem  civilisation  is  a  whole.  It  is  doubtful  if  modem 
machinery  can  be  used  without  introducing  modem  ideas  and 
a  measure  of  liberty  for  the  individual  and  democracy  for  the 
mass.     To  be  able  to  borrow  the  money  for  railroads,  passing 


ii6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

through  a  non-industrial  region  that  does  not  give  profits  in  the 
early  years,  one  must  have  high  taxes  to  pay  the  interest  on  the 
railway  bonds.  To  get  carrying  profits  even  from  the  grain- 
trade  in  an  impoverished  country,  the  export  business  must  be 
developed.  But  high  taxes  can  only  be  secured  from  the  high 
profits  of  modem  industry  and  modem  agriculture,  and  it  is 
only  the  latter  than  can  produce  enough  surplus  grain  to  keep 
going  an  export  trade.  Modem  industry  needs  metal  and  not 
paper  money.  A  debtor  nation  must  have  a  large  export  trade, 
and  the  export  trade  may  make  possible  gold  money.  It  is 
all  one  piece  — modem  armies  and  fleets  and  military  railroads, 
a  large  government  debt,  high  taxes,  gold  money,  large  agricul- 
tural exports  and  a  protected  industry.  And  all  this  was  forced 
on  the  unwilling  Czars  by  the  fact  that  Russia  is  an  integral  part 
of  the  modern  world. 
4^^  State  capitalism  went  further  in  Russia  than  elsewhere. 
In  monopolising  the  manufacture  of  spirits  Witte  undertook 
one  of  the  very  largest  businesses  in  the  country;  in  founding 
mortgage  banks  and  pushing  the  active  participation  of  the 
Government  banks  and  railroads  in  the  furtherance  or  hindrance 
of  this  or  that  business  enterprise,  he  became  the  financial 
dictator  of  the  country  as  much  as  the  Czar,  his  master,  is  the 
direct  dictator  over  its  political  and  military  life.  And  as  the 
Czar,  his  master,  was  helpless  before  the  great  fact  of  human 
nature,  that  men  cannot  be  governed  by  external  violence, 
so  Witte  was  helpless  against  the  great  economic  fact  that  the 
prosperity  of  a  nation  cannot  be  attained  without  the  economic 
elevation  of  the  masses  of  the  people. 

The  Council  of  State  confessed  at  the  end  of  the  year  1902 
that  "the  Government  is  powerless  for  the  reorganisation  of  the 
life  of  the  peasants  and  the  assistance  of  agricultural  industry." 
This  is  an  acknowledgment  of  the  complete  economic  failure 
of  the  Czarism.  Three-fourths  of  the  Russian  people  are 
peasants  and  two-thirds  of  her  wealth  comes  from  agricultural 
industry.  What  is  the  use  of  State  socialism  or  autocratic 
capitalism  if  all  economic  hope  of  regenerating  "  in  this 
epoch"  the  chief  national  industry  and  the  chief  industrial 
class  is  abandoned?  For  Witte  has  used  in  the  State 
budget   the  explicit  words  that  this  regeneration  must  belong 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  117 

to    a    future   epoch  — that  is,    a   future   generation,   or   even 
a  future  century. 

Witte  was  forced  to  avow  his  helplessness  not  by  war  or 
revolution,  for  neither  had  yet  begun,  but  by  the  inevitable 
industrial  crisis  that  must  arise  when  it  is  sought  to  build  up  a 
modem  industry  among  a  people  a  large  part  of  which  is 
starving  every  other  year,  and  is  happy  to  have  enough  to  eat 
let  alone  being  able  to  purchase  the  product  of  the  countries* 
factories  or  to  give  goods  or  passengers  to  its  railroads. 

But  before  this  frank  confession  of  failure  had  been  forced 
on  Witte  by  the  tremendous  panic  and  crash  of  Russian  industry 
in  1900,  which  he  himself  had  feared,  he  had  already  succeeded 
in  one-third  revolutionising  the  economy  of  Russia.  I  say  one- 
third  revolutionising,  for  many  of  the  best  Russian  economists 
contend  that  the  same  policy  by  which  he  revolutionised  Russian 
industry  is  largely  accountable  for  the  progressive  and  constant 
decay  of  agriculture. 

As  I  have  suggested,  the  modernising  process  in  the  national 
economy  began  at  the  time  of  the  emancipation  of  the  serfs 
in  1861.  It  took  a  much  more  rapid  course,  on  the  ascension 
of  Alexander  III.  in  1882,  under  Witte's  predecessor  Wishne- 
gradsky.  It  was  he  that  first  introduced  the  high  protective 
customs  tariff  and  increased  every  other  form  of  indirect  taxation 
on  articles  of  consumption.  As  fast  as  the  peasants  began  to 
use  some  manufactured  and  imported  article,  or  rather  as  fast 
as  the  non-starving  minority  were  able  to  do  this,  the  article 
was  burdened  with  a  crushing  taxation.  A  part  of  the  peasants 
began  to  drink  tea  with  sugar,  to  wear  cotton,  to  use  petroleum, 
and  matches  and  to  employ  steel  ploughs  and  iron  nails.  Almost 
in  proportion  to  the  increased  use  the  taxes  were  raised.  Again 
and  again  this  happened,  and  was  repeated  under  Witte,  and 
was  repeated  again  in  the  last  two  years,  until  the  already 
miserable  Russian  peasant  now  pays  two,  three,  and  four  times 
as  much  for  these  articles  as  do  the  people  of  Germany  or  France. 
The  result  has  been  that,  although  the  cost  of  producing  such 
simple  articles  is  falling  enormously  everywhere  and  the 
consumption  doubling  again  and  again,  consumption  has  risen 
very  slowly  in  all  Russia  and  still  more  slowly  among  those  most 
in  need.     The  peasant  can  afford  only  the  fewest  nails,  the 


ii8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

cheapest  plough,  and  almost  no  petroleum.  His  single  shirt 
must  last  a  season,  sugar  is  a  luxury  and  his  beloved  tea  an 
occasional  drink. 

Under  Witte's  predecessor  the  peasants  were  already  begin- 
ning to  bear  the  new  load  of  the  railroads  and  manufacturing 
industry,  added  to  the  already  crushing  payments  they  were 
forced  to  make  to  their  former  masters  for  their  so-called  freedom 
and  the  possession  of  a  part  of  the  land  they  had  always  occu- 
pied. In  1 89 1  the  customs  tariff  was  again  increased;  during 
Witte's  first  ten  years,  1892-190 2,  the  mileage  of  the  Russian 
railways  was  doubled,  the  operations  of  the  State  banks  were 
still  more  rapidly  increased  and  a  new  bank  was  formed  for  lend- 
ing money  to  the  nobility;  in  1894  the  State  monopolised  the 
alcohol  industry,  and  in  1897  the  gold  standard  was  finally 
established. 

All  these  measures  were  again  bound  together  as  a  single 
whole  along  with  the  export  of  grain.  For  evidently  the  gold 
standard  could  not  be  maintained  unless  from  year  to  year  Russia 
should  receive  from  abroad  in  payment  for  her  exports  a  sum 
of  gold  sufficient  to  enable  her  to  pay  the  interest  on  the  huge 
sums  she  was  borrowing.  But  the  peasants  export  very  little, 
since  they  produce  scarcely  enough  for  their  own  elementary 
needs.  While  they  were  crushed  with  the  indirect  taxes  required 
to  support  the  new  huge  and  artificial  economic  structure,  their 
enemies,  the  landlords,  were  allowed  to  reach  their  hands  into 
the  treasury  of  this  poverty-stricken  State.  They  were  loaned 
money  below  the  current  rates  and  in  amounts  greater  than 
their  properties  justified.  Having  one  bank  for  this  purpose, 
another  was  created  with  the  high-sounding  name  of  "Peasants' 
Bank"  to  enable  the  most  needy  landlords  to  sell  out  at  high 
prices  to  the  few  prospering  peasants  who  had  elevated  them- 
selves by  usury  to  their  starving  neighbours  and  in  their  turn 
have  become  rich  proprietors  —  some  having  by  now  millions 
of  acres.  But  more  than  this,  Witte  stated  that  he  did  what 
he  could  in  this  starving  country,  which  was  no  little,  to  keep 
up  the  prices  of  grain  for  the  landlord's  benefit. 

But  the  famines  came  along  regularly  every  other  year,  boun- 
tiful foreign  crops  or  financial  crises  lowered  prices  in  spite  of 
him,  and  Witte  confessed  finally  to  the  Czar  that  they  did  not 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  119 

possess  the  economic  dictatorship  of  the  earth,  Witte  was  fond 
of  saying  to  his  own  associates:  **  But  you  don't  know  the  cards." 
He  had  not  played  his  last  card  and  had  a  most  disagreeable  sur- 
prise in  store  for  the  landlords  and  the  Czar.  We  need  not 
accuse  Witte  of  duplicity  at  this  point.  He  had  always  favoured 
industry  —  even  though  sometimes  only  as  a  home  market  for 
agriculture.  He  now  felt  himself  strong  enough,  and  his 
policies  far  enough  in  practice,  to  display  his  hand. 

The  budget  speech  of  1897  is  already  addressed  to  a  greater 
power  in  the  end  than  the  Russian  landlords,  that  is,  to  inter- 
national capital.  Of  course  his  relations  with  the  great  bankers 
were  private.  The  budget  address  is  aimed  at  their  prot^g^s, 
the  small  investors.  The  minister  of  finance  finds  now  that 
low  agricultural  prices  have  their  good  sides  for  other  elements 
than  the  landlords.  And  he  boasts  that  the  product  of  industry 
is  now  greater  than  that  of  agriculture.  Industry  had  increased 
rapidly  though  artificially,  but  Witte  used  here  a  very  vulgar 
prospectus  writer's  trick.  The  product  of  agriculture  he 
reckoned  at  one  and  a  half  billion  rubles,  that  of  industry  at 
two  billions.  But  a  large  part  of  the  value  of  the  product  of 
industry  is  due  merely  to  raw  material.  The  expert  De  Vaux 
reckoned  the  net  product  at  this  time  as  four  hundred  million 
or  one-fifth  as  much  as  Witte. 

Instead  of  being  the  rich  country  Witte  boasted,  Russia  is 
almost  incredibly  poor.  One  of  Witte 's  modem  devices  was 
the  savings  banks.  The  pennies  of  the  non-starving  minority 
of  the  people  were  collected  in  Government  saloons,  post- 
offices,  railway-stations,  ships,  barracks,  and  even  schools  — 
from  the  first  to  the  last  always  the  pitiful  total  of  about  five 
rubles  from  each  depositor.  In  the  fifteen  years  of  Witte's 
administration  (1891—1906)  the  total  of  the  depositors  increased 
from  one  to  five  million,  of  the  deposits  from  two  hundred  to 
one  thousand  million  rubles.  The  bank  was  a  good  piece  of 
business  for  the  Government.  But  it  is  only  another  sign  of 
the  poverty  of  this  vast  nation.  The  bank  has  ceased  to 
grow  so  rapidly  and  probably  most  of  the  available  pennies 
are  already  collected.  What  is  a  billion  rubles  among  a 
hundred  and  forty  million  people  ?  The  savings  banks  of  other 
smaller  coimtries  have  ten  times  as  much. 


OF  THE      ^y 

R3(TY 


120  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

This  money  of  course  nearly  all  goes  over  to  the  Government. 
It  is  like  another  tax.  The  Government  pays  low  interest  and 
gets  high.  At  first  the  money  went  directly  into  Government 
bonds.  But  wise  and  modem  Witte  has  put  it  into  his  rail- 
ways and  his  land  banks.  And  in  spite  of  all,  the  show  remains 
a  wretched  one.  In  1902,  after  all  Witte's  borrowing,  Russia 
had  only  forty-two  thousand  miles  of  railways  to  two  hundred 
thousand  in  the  United  States.  Moreover,  perhaps  a  fourth  of 
Russia's  roads  are  merely  military  and  most  of  them  are  miserably 
built  and  equipped.  The  estimates  for  all  the  Russian  state 
railways  (two-thirds  of  the  total)  in  the  budget  of  1906  were 
pitifully  small  —  for  construction  forty-two  million  rubles,  for 
improvements  twelve  million,  for  rolling  stock  two  million, 
and  for  repair  of  locomotives  three  million.  Divide  these  figures 
by  two  to  bring  them  to  dollars  and  they  will  not  by  any  means 
be  as  high  as  those  of  several  private  American  companies 
for  the  same  year.  No  wonder  the  bitter  and  ceaseless  com- 
plaints that  appear  from  day  to  day  in  the  Russian  press  from 
every  branch  of  business.  Every  day  products  are  undelivered, 
factories  closed  for  lack  of  fuel,  perishable  goods  ruined  in  trans- 
port and  whole  train-loads  destroyed  by  accidents. 

Russia  is  wretchedly  provided  with  railroads;  the  United 
States  has  eight  times  as  many  miles  for  each  soul  of  her  popu- 
lation. But  still  Russia  will  find  it  difficult  to  build  more  until 
it  is  arranged  that  her  people  shall  cease  to  starve.  Witte 
boasted  that  the  annual  loss  on  the  railroads,  had  fallen  from 
one  hundred  and  seventy-six  million  rubles  in  1892  to  ninety 
million  in  1897.  According  to  the  juggled  official  figures  it 
fell  to  only  thirty-five  million  in  1901,  but  by  1903  it  had 
risen  again  to  sixty  million  and  is  not  likely  soon  to  fall. 

Far  worse,  and  in  the  end  a  greater  waste,  for  the  country  is 
the  almost  complete  absence  of  roads.  I  have  seen  almost  no 
paved  roads  except  for  a  few  miles  from  the  towns  and  across 
some  of  the  properties  of  the  grand  dukes  of  the  Czar.  The 
mileage  of  paved  roads  in  France  is  one  hundred  and  in  Great 
Britain  six  hundred  times  as  great  as  in  Russia. 

In  fact  Russia  has  none  of  the  elements  of  great  wealth  except 
the  raw  materials  of  the  earth  that  would  have  been  there 
were  the  land  without  people  at  all.     She  has  neither  a  great 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  121 

agriculture,  a  great  transportation  system,  a  great  industry, 
a  great  internal,  or  a  great  external  trade  in  proportion  to 
her  population.  The  value  of  the  products  of  Russian  indus- 
try as  reckoned  by  Witte  in  1897  was  less  than  one-tenth,  that 
of  agriculture  one-fifteenth,  of  those  of  the  United  States.  The 
Russian  farmers,  confesses  Witte,  are  in  the  economic  position 
of  Exiropean  farmers  of  1800  or  1850.  I  shall  later  show  this 
to  be  a  fact. 

The  Russian  farmer  gets  only  one-third  the  product  per 
acre  the  English  or  German  does,  though  he  has  a  much  better 
soil.  While  the  total  wheat  product  of  the  United  States 
increased  more  than  a  third  during  the  last  decade,  that  of 
miserable  Russia  increased  less  than  one-tenth,  not  as  fast  as 
the  population.  During  this  period  while  Russian  exports  of 
wheat  remained  about  the  same,  ours  nearly  doubled 

But  as  I  have  shown,  the  whole  economic  structure  of  Russian 
society  and  the  credit  of  the  Government  rests  largely  on  the 
exports,  of  which  two-thirds  are  grain  and  all  but  3  per 
cent,  raw  or  half -raw  products.  The  export  of  animals  and 
animal  products  in  this  vast  country,  so  much  better  adapted  to 
the  purposes  of  animal  raising  than  Canada,  is  less  than  one- 
tenth  that  of  the  latter  comparatively  small  country.  Russia 
exports  less  wool  than  she  imports  and  less  than  ten  other 
smaller  countries. 

The  total  trade  of  Russia  increased  in  the  last  decade  be- 
fore the  war,  only  25  per  cent.,  less  rapidly  than  the  popu- 
lation. The  exports,  however,  increased  only  14  per  cent, 
and  the  so  necessary  favourable  balance  of  trade,  or  superiority 
of  exports  over  imports,  fell  by  one-third.  More  recently,  in 
1903,  1904,  and  1905,  it  seems  surprising  to  find  that  this  balance 
has  doubled.  The  explanation  of  this,  according  to  a  personal 
remark  of  Finance  Minister  Shipov,  was  that  the  peasants  were 
so  necessitous  that  they  were  forced  to  sell  products  needed  by 
their  animals  and  themselves,  and  these  products  were  then 
exported.  But  even  then  the  balance  was  only  about  four 
hundred  million  rubles,  not  enough  to  pay  the  annual  interest 
on  the  foreign  debts  of  the  State,  the  railroads,  and  the  great 
industrial  enterprises.  And  then  came,  in  the  years  1906  and 
1907,  the  periodical  famine. 


122  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  false  policy  of  the  minister  of  finance  kept  up  the  exports 
the  first  of  these  years  in  order  to  pay  the  country's  bad  debts, 
but  now  even  reactionaries  are  demanding  the  prohibition  of 
the  export  of  the  food  of  a  starving  people.  The  Government 
has  not  forbidden,  but  it  has  discouraged,  the  shipping  away 
of  grain,  and  this  has  rapidly  diminished. 

But  in  the  coming  decade,  as  in  the  last,  reckoning  every 
second  or  third  year  as  a.  famine  year,  as  has  been  the  case  for 
several  decades,  the  excess  of  exports  over  imports  will  scarcely 
average  more  than  two  hundred  million  rubles,  or  less  than  half 
enough  to  pay  the  interest,  to  say  nothing  of  payments  on  the 
principal,  on  the  foreign  debt. 

Whether  the  Russian  Government  is  a  failure  as  a  business 
institution  or  not,  it  is  certain  that  the  nation  imder  its  present 
masters  is  not  a  successful  business  concern.  The  Government 
has  the  advantage  over  the  nation  in  that  it  can  secure  money 
from  abroad,  either  through  the  hope  of  the  lenders  that  it  will 
be  able  to  shoot  and  whip  more  taxes  out  of  the  people,  or  that 
it  will  lend  the  aid  of  its  rifles  and  cannons  or  warships  to  some 
foreign  ally.  In  either  case  the  foreign  investor  is  lending  not 
to  a  business,  but  to  an  army  of  mercenaries. 

And  in  either  case  there  are  two  sides  to  this  bargain.  If 
the  foreign  investor  in  Russian  bonds  agrees  to  ask  no  question 
as  to  where  or  how  the  Czar  gets  the  money  to  pay  him  his 
interest,  the  Czar  must  furnish  the  guns.  He  is  subject  to  a 
large  extent  to  the  wishes  of  the  creditors  to  whom  he  must 
appeal  year  after  year.  Already  the  most  powerful  reactionary 
and  Governmental  organ  has  protested  angrily  that  it  is  not 
the  Duma  but  the  foreign  financiers  that  constitute  Russia's 
real  parliament. 

This,  then,  is  where  the  new  finance  and  the  last  hope  of 
the  autocracy  has  led  —  to  a  permanent  financial  dependence 
on  foreign  capital.  And  if  internal  poverty  is  the  weakness 
of  Witte's  policy,  it  is  this  external  dependence  that  is  its  strength. 
The  international  bankers  are  exacting,  but  they  are  the 
powerful  and  invaluable  friends  that  are  keeping  the  Czarism 
together.  For  the  Czarism  is  not  supported  by  Russia  —  the 
Russians  would  have  destroyed  it  long  ago  —  but  by  the  whole 
world  through  its  gold. 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  123 

Russia  is  poor  but  the  world  is  rich.  The  Russian  finances 
in  themselves  are  as  hopeless  as  were  those  of  France  before  the 
Revolution.  But  at  that  time  there  was  not  a  tithe  of  the  wealth 
there  is  in  the  world  to-day,  and  all  the  nations  but  England 
were  poorer  than  France.  Now  there  are  four  great  nations 
each  with  several  times  the  wealth  of  Russia,  and  four  smaller 
ones  as  rich.  All  the  older  countries  are  overflowing  with 
capital  seeking  profitable  investment,  and  Russia,  like  India 
or  China,  has  become  a  financial  protectorate  of  international 
capital. 

Already  Russia  is  the  heaviest  indebted  as  well  as  the  poorest 
of  the  great  nations.  The  Government  has  borrowed  five 
billion  rubles  for  military  purposes  and  three  billion  for  the 
railways,  while  Russia's  private  railways  and  industries  have 
indebted  themselves  for  an  almost  equal  sum.  From  1890  to 
1896  there  were  four  large  Government  loans,  from  1897  to  1903 
most  of  the  borrowing  was  private.  Since  the  war  every  year 
again  requires  large  borrowings  from  abroad.  The  taxes  have 
been  brought  nearly  to  the  limits;  the  chief  expenditures,  the 
military  and  naval,  are  about  to  be  increased,  for  only  by 
maintaining  her  armed  strength  does  Russia  obtain  her  foreign 
military  allies  and  loans.  It  seems  that  the  deficit  of  several 
hundred  millions,  euphemistically  called  in  the  budget 
"extraordinary  expenditure,"  must  remain.  Every  year  or  two 
will  see  a  new  loan,  just  as  every  two  or  three  years  sees  a  new 
famine.  The  sums  paid  for  interest  will  increase  and  the 
Government's  financial  position  will  remain  of  the  most  difficult. 
It  will  not  mean  bankruptcy  unless  there  is  some  international 
military  or  financial  crisis.  For  if  the  Government  has  not  the 
power  to  make  fundamental  financial  reforms,  it  can,  with  the 
aid  of  foreign  capital,  maintain  the  present  taxes  and 
expenditure. 

But  the  country  is  clamouring  for  reform  and  reform  can 
mean  in  a  position  like  Russia's  nothing  but  decreased  taxation 
or  increased  Government  expenditure.  Those  who  want  any- 
thing fundamental,  whether  it  is  a  new  fleet  or  better  schools, 
will  have  to  solve  the  financial  problem.  And  they  will  soon 
see  that  it  is  useless  to  go  to  the  Government,  and  will  begin 
more  and  more  to  look  over  the  head  of  the  minister  of  finance 


124  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

and  the  Czar,  to  their  financial  masters  abroad.  Here  also 
they  will  get  no  more  than  they  have  already  gotten,  and  all 
the  vigorous  forces  of  the  country,  both  revolutionary  and 
reactionary,  may  turn  against  the  foreign  creditor.  Already 
the  revolutionaries  have  announced  they  will  recognise  no  loan 
not  authorised  by  a  people's  Duma,  and  the  reactionaries  almost 
as  a  man  declare  that  Witte  has  turned  over  Russia  to  the 
international  Jews  (e.  g.,  financiers).  The  popular  measure 
would  be  the  suspension  of  interest  on  the  bonds  or  its  payment 
in  paper  money,  rather  of  course  than  the  cruder  cancellation 
of  the  debt. 

In  the  meanwhile  private  capital  is  not  accumulating  to  any 
great  extent  in  Russia,  simply  because  the  larger  share  of 
profitable  business  has  been  monopolised  by  the  Government. 
According  to  Witte's  figures,  already  quoted,  the  private  income 
of  Russia  cannot  be  more  than  two  or  three  billion  rubles. 
But  the  Government  industries  and  railroads  themselves  produce 
a  billion  gross  income  and  it  takes  another  billion  from  the 
people  in  the  form  of  taxes.  The  Government  besides  borrows 
several  hundred  million,  which  is  several  times  as  much  as 
private  enterprises  get  from  abroad.  The  Russian  people,  then, 
already  owes  most  of  its  income  directly  to  the  Government, 
whether  in  the  form  of  salaries,  purchases,  or  contracts.  The 
way  to  make  money ,  then,  is  not  to  go  into  business,  but  to  stand 
in  with  the  officials  or  to  be  one.  Naturally  the  accumulation 
of  capital  under  these  conditions  is  slow.  Without  materially 
diminishing  poverty  State  capitalism  has  made  all  but  impossible 
the  rapid  accumulation  of  wealth. 

Witte's  conception  of  the  omnipotent  state  went  so  far  as  to 
consider  it  as  the  "dispenser  of  credit"  and  arbiter  of  industry. 
He  dilates  upon  the  greatness  of  this  power,  but  never  once  sug- 
gests that  it  might  be  used  to  enable  the  peasant  to  support 
himself  and  accumulate  capital  enough  to  modernise  his  agri- 
culture. Witte  simply  delivered  the  economic  policy  of  the 
Government  for  a  short  time  from  the  hands  of  the  landlords 
and  gave  it  over  to  the  foreign  financiers.  The  Japanese  war 
loans  strengthened  the  grip  of  the  financiers,  but  the  dismissal 
of  Witte,  the  reaction  against  all  liberalism,  and  the  third 
Duma,  seem  again  about  to  deliver  it  over  to  the  landlords. 


AUTOCRACY'S   LAST   HOPE  125 

Still  more  likely  is  a  return  under  the  leadership  of  Stolypine 
and  Gutchkov  to  the  middle  course  followed  during  the  reign 
of  the  father  of  the  present  Czar,  by  which  Russian  landlords 
and  foreign  capitalists  inside  and  outside  of  Russia  divide 
among  them  all  the  rich  profits  of  the  benevolent  despotism 
that  do  not  fall  to  the  bureaucracy's  lot. 

Inertia,  reaction,  or  merely  formal  reform,  these  are  the 
three  courses  open  to  the  Government,  but  the  greatest  of  these 
is  inertia.  Inertia  defeated  completely  the  heroic  measures 
of  Peter  the  Great  to  Prussianise  his  empire  and  reduced  his 
bureaus  to  parodies  in  later  years.  The  impossibility  of  bringing 
about  any  great  economic  reforms  in  a  country  presided  over 
by  violence,  and  where  neither  freedom  of  contract  nor  equality 
before  the  law  nor  inviolability  either  of  property  or  labour 
prevail,  the  contradiction  of  obtaining  the  funds  for  the  carry- 
ing out  of  such  reforms  by  promising  the  aid  of  the  Russian 
army  in  case  of  war,  or  by  guaranteeing  the  use  of  the  same 
arbitrary  power  to  squeeze  the  money  in  some  way  out  of  the 
people  —  all  this  is  reducing  to  a  still  more  tragic  parody  Witte's 
efforts  to  modernise  Russia  by  marrying  the  autocracy  to  the 
money-power.  The  union  has  taken  place  and  it  has  brought 
its  fruits.  But  it  is  like  a  union  of  royal  houses.  The  people 
were  not  consulted.  But  they  are  already  surly  and  the  strength 
of  sullen  resistance  knows  no  bounds.  There  are  economic  laws 
even  in  Russia.  Against  these  neither  the  Czarism  nor  capi- 
talism is  able  to  have  its  will.  What  these  laws  are  I  can  say 
only  after  I  have  spoken  of  the  people,  of  the  new  Russia  that 
is  in  some  degree  independent  of  the  Government,  and  of  the 
several  efforts  to  bring  the  people  to  a  consciousness  of  the 
economic  realities  in  which  they  live. 


CHAPTER   XI 

THE    peoples'    enemies    ARE    THE    CZAR's    ALLIES 

NEITHER  reform  by  violence  nor  the  State  Socialism 
(or  State  capitalism)  has  put  any  check  on  the  campaign 
of  the  reactionary  classes  against  progress.  The  present  ten- 
dency of  the  Russian  Government  is  the  resultant  of  these  three 
forces  —  the  strengthening  and  better  organisation  of  the  brute 
power  of  the  State,  its  absorption  of  private  industry,  and 
measures  against  liberty  of  the  individual  in  every  sphere  of 
private  and  public  life  —  the  "coming  slavery"  that  haunted 
Herbert  Spencer. 

This  tendency  will  be  maintained  until  the  Czar  has  been 
forced  to  acknowledge,  not  that  he  has  voluntarily  granted  some 
reform  while  his  power  remains  intact,  but  that  the  people  have 
compelled  him  to  abdicate  or  to  share  his  power. 

The  coming  Government,  like  the  present  one,  will  be  rich 
and  strong.  It  will  not  need  to  bother  about  the  details  of 
the  persecution  of  the  individual.  But  it  will  still  need  the 
support,  against  the  ever  rising  tide  of  revolutionary  feeling, 
of  certain  classes  that  receive  their  income  from  privilege 
rather  than  directly  from  the  coffers  of  the  State.  It  will  have 
to  seek  the  aid  of  these  through  lending  them  the  arbitrary 
power  of  the  State  to  crush  their  rivals  on  the  principle  shown 
in  an  earlier  chapter,  or,  as  we  shall  now  see,  to  crush  their 
employees.  It  will  be  done,  not  in  disorder  as  now,  but  by  law 
as  the  moderate  reactionaries  suggest. 

Western  Europeans  and  Americans  do  not  have  the  habit 
of  mind  of  thinking  of  social  evolution  as  sometimes  going 
backward.  There  has  been  too  much  prosperity  in  the  past 
century  in  America,  Great  Britain,  and  France  for  these  countries 
to  have  a  very  defined  idea  of  the  reverse  of  progress.  Never- 
theless we  all  know  that  a  nation  can  move  backward,  and 
we  must  realise  that  it  is  on  the  whole  reaction  which  is  desired 

126 


PEOPLES'   ENEMIES  ARE   CZAR'S   ALLIES       127 

by  a  large  part,  if  not  the  majority,  of  Russia's  ruling  classes  — 
not  because  they  hate  progress  in  the  abstract  but  because  they 
hate  it  in  Russia  where  it  endangers  their  incomes,  their  priv- 
ileges and  their  domination. 

The  changes  will  begin  at  the  bottom,  they  will  be  tried 
first  in  the  schools.  There  must  be  no  more  trouble  from  the 
unruly  children  of  the  rich  and  privileged  who  now  absorb 
ideals  of  progress  and  liberty  and  upset  the  universities.  They 
will  be  trained  to  worship  the  Emperor,  to  spend  their  youth 
in  dissipation,  to  ignore  every  serious  interest  and  study  except 
that  of  their  future  official  career,  and  to  hate  foreigners,  peas- 
ants, and  working  people,  as  do  the  youths  of  the  Prussian 
universities  at  the  present  time. 

The  monarchists'  congress  in  Moscow  (July,  1907)  demanded 
a  "sound  Russian  national  school."  A  model  specimen  has 
indeed  just  been  opened  in  St.  Petersburg.  We  can  picture 
how  it  may  carry  the  Prussian  school  idea  beyond  anything  ever 
approached  on  its  native  soil.  In  connection  with  the  same 
propaganda  for  the  enforcement  of  sound  national  ideas  the 
congress  insisted  on  the  "effective"  punishment  of  agitation 
in  the  press,  as  if  the  censorship  had  not  already  gone  beyond 
anything  known  in  modem  times. 

The  reactionaries  are  clamouring  for  the  same  programme 
they  were  in  the  past,  based,  first  of  all,  on  opposition  to  all 
traces  of  democracy  in  the  Government,  and  next  on  the  "prior- 
ity of  the  Russian  race  in  Russia,"  with  all  the  persecution 
this  implies.  They  are  still  insisting  on  the  continuance  of  the 
principles  of  Alexander  III.,  followed  by  the  present  Czar 
without  exception  for  the  first  ten  years  of  his  reign,  and  restored 
to  the  ftdl  in  the  creation  of  the  new  landlords'  Duma.  Whether 
the  reaction  has  restored  the  landlords  to  power,  or  the 
landlords  have  brought  about  the  reaction,  will  never  be 
decided.  No  Russian  could  ever  imagine  either  landlord  power 
or  reaction  as  existing  independent  of  the  other. 

At  the  monarchist  congress  preceding  the  one  I  have  just 
mentioned  the  president,  the  nobleman  and  landlord  Shere- 
batov,  declared  that  d\iring  the  revolution  the  nobility  had 
either  kept  silent  or  in  the  persons  of  its  leaders  had  joined 
the  enemy.     Now  the  landlord  class  has  awakened,  expelled 


ia8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

from  its  assemblies  most  of  these  traitorous  leaders,  and  its  con- 
gresses together  with  the  League  of  Russian  Men  have  directed 
the  policies  of  the  Government.  It  was  the  landlords* 
organisation  and  the  league  that  demanded  the  dissolution  of 
the  first  Duma,  and  the  coup  d'etat  that  dissolved  the  second 
and  put  the  people's  representatives  in  an  insignificant  minority 
by  an  election  law  framed  directly  contrary  to  the  Czar's  so-called 
unchangeable  fundamental  laws. 

These  monarchists  congresses,  then,  have  a  great  significance. 
They  indicate  clearly  the  position  of  Russia's  ruling  class, 
since  both  the  league  and  the  landlords  are  represented  there. 
The  president's  speech  in  1906  was  a  beacon  in  the  often  incom- 
prehensible obscurity  of  reaction.  If  the  Duma  should  be 
abolished  altogether,  says  this  courtier  and  landlord,  let  us  hope 
it  will  be  replaced  by  an  assembly  of  the  old  Russian  character 
composed  exclusively  of  "the  population  that  composes  Russia's 
roots."  The  Czar  did  not  follow  this  advice  in  its  entirety; 
he  preserved  the  name  of  Duma,  and  left  a  few  representatives 
to  the  Caucasians  and  Poles.  But  he  certainly  went  more  than 
half  way  toward  the  goal.  One  more  short  step  and  it  will 
be  reached. 

"The  principle  of  the  sovereign  prerogatives  of  the  Russian 
nation"  must  be  expressed  in  several  ways  said  Sherebatov. 
First,  all  the  responsible  official  positions  are  to  be  filled  with 
scions  of  pure  Russian  stock,  and  even  at  least  half  the  clerks 
must  be  of  the  dominant  race.  The  congress  of  1907  went 
further  and  extended  its  protection  not  only  to  Russian  clerks 
but  even  to  Russian  servants.  It  decided  its  members  were  to 
use  every  means  to  get  positions  among  Christian  families  for 
such  servants  as  were  employed  by  Jews.  It  is  indeed  wise  for 
the  league  to  promise  something  to  the  servants,  for  it  is  among 
the  most  ignorant  of  these  that  it  obtains  in  the  larger  cities 
most  of  its  members. 

The  difficulty  of  the  league  and  other  organisations  supported 
by  the  landlords,  is  not  to  influence  the  Government,  but  to 
get  members.  There  are  only  about  a  hundred  thousand  noble 
landlords.  The  Government  officials,  house-servants  and  small 
shopkeepers  do  not  form  a  tithe  of  the  population.  The 
peasantry,    conceded    Sherebatov,    was    in    commotion    and. 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES   ARE   CZAR'S   ALLIES       129 

"without  noticing  it,"  he  claims,  "followed  the  revolutionists." 
It  is  hoped  to  win  these  back  through  the  priesthood.  The 
resolution  passed  by  this  congress  about  the  punishing  of  any 
priests  who  make  themselves  offensive  by  their  liberality  in  the 
Duma,  or  in  any  way  opposing  the  league's  principles,  is  being 
carried  into  effect.  Every  day  priests  who  have  assumed  any 
kind  of  popular  leadership  are  immured  in  the  monasteries, 
those  who  spoke  for  the  people  in  the  Duma  have  been  unfrocked, 
and  two-thirds  of  the  present  delegation  in  the  Duma  is  composed 
of  reactionaries  of  the  most  violent  character. 

This  extraordinary  movement  that  professes  to  be  so  loyal 
to  the  Czar  is  strangely  opposed  to  the  Government.  It 
savagely  attacks  officialdom  for  losing  the  Japanese  war  and 
wants  an  account  of  the  nation's  expenditures.  It  is  opposed 
to  the  arbitrariness  and  corruption  in  the  bureaucracy  to  the 
point  that  it  would  destroy  the  bureaucracy's  power.  But  not 
by  making  ministers  and  officials  responsible  to  the  Duma. 
Oh,  no,  this  would  be  democratic.  They  are  to  be  made  more 
responsible  to  —  the  Czar!  To  the  Czar's  thousand  bureaus 
and  councils  is  to  be  added  another,  a  supreme  court,  above 
all  the  others  and  directly  answerable  to  the  "Most  High." 
To  this  court  each  of  Russia's  sixty  million  adult  citizens  is  to 
have  access,  and  all  will  be  well.  Such  is  the  political  science 
of  the  reactionary  mind. 

The  political  economy  of  our  "Czarists"  may  be  summed 
up  in  a  word.  The  State  is  all.  I  have  spoken  of  the  steps 
toward  the  State  monopoly  of  industry,  transportation  and 
credit.  The  professional  reactionist  does  not  stop  half-way; 
he  always  goes  further  than  the  Government.  The  State,  which 
is  all,  surely  need  not  burden  itself  with  the  necessity  of  keeping 
hoarded  up  a  supply  of  gold  as  the  basis  for  money.  Paper 
money  is  not  only  a  natural  demand  in  a  desperately  impover- 
ished and  indebted  country,  it  is  the  inevitable  logical  outcome 
of  all  the  thinking  and  all  the  principles,  such  as  they  are,  that 
imderlie  the  Czarism. 

The  Czars  have  never  ruled  alone.  They  have  always  had 
the  indispensable  support  of  a  powerful  ruling  caste.  The 
autocracy  has  merely  been  the  device  by  which  this  oligarchy 
has  governed.     While  subjecting  themselves  absolutely  to  the 


I30  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

autocrat,  the  landlords  have  relied  on  the  fact  that  it  is  from 
their  ranks  that  are  naturally  chosen  courtiers,  ministers, 
generals  and  administrators.  Landlords  are  the  chief  source 
of  the  Czar's  information,  teach  him  in  childhood,  advise  him 
when  he  governs,  execute  his  orders,  and  organise  the  demon- 
strations of  loyalty  that  give  some  appearance  of  popularity 
to  the  system.  In  return  the  landlords  have  offered  the  Czar 
a  loyal  and  zealous  support.  Whatever  causes  they  may  have 
had  for  complaint,  no  considerable  part  of  the  landlords  have 
for  centuries  been  so  foolish  as  to  attempt  to  overthrow  a  system 
that  has  worked  so  admirably  in  their  interests.  When  the 
Czars  have  been  wise,  they  have  done  everything  in  their  power 
for  the  landlord  class.  When  they  have  been  weak,  innumerable 
wealthy  or  ambitious  landlords  have  crowded  to  the  court  to 
become  the  true  governors  of  the  land.  But  only  rarely  have 
the  landlords  tried  to  moderate,  and  never  have  they  tried  to 
abolish,  the  autocratic  system. 

So  for  a  thousand  years  the  people  of  Russia  have  been 
living  under  a  double  slavery  —  abject  economic  subjection  to 
the  landlords,  and  abject  political  subjection  to  the  State. 
But  always  while  the  people  owed  a  double  servitude,  the 
masters  were  really  one.  The  Czar  himself  is  the  greatest  land- 
holder and  the  natural  head  of  the  class.  The  landlords  owe 
their  property,  their  privileges,  and  their  power  to  their  influence 
over  the  Czar.  There  were  never  those  very  serious  conflicts 
among  the  members  of  nobility,  and  between  the  nobility 
and  the  chief  ruler,  that  gave  the  people  a  chance  to  obtain  a 
share  of  the  power  in  other  European  states.  There  were  no 
artificial  boundaries  to  give  rise  to  independent  robber  barons; 
the  constant  threat  of  Tartar  and  Turkish  invasion  strengthened 
the  military  power  and  maintained  the  absolute  dominion  of 
the  Czar,  There  were  no  great  seaports  or  trading  centres  to 
build  up  independent  towns,  no  industries  to  create  a  buffer 
middle-class.  When  occasionally  the  Czar's  generals  and 
governors  were  chosen  from  among  the  people  they  at  once 
became  landlords,  since  the  land  constituted  the  sole  great 
treasure  of  the  State  from  which  to  draw  their  rewards. 

For  centuries  the  peasants  have  borne  this  double  servitude 
under  changing  forms.     During  these  centuries  serfdom  was 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES  ARE  CZAR'S  ALLIES        131 

instituted  and  then  abolished,  and  finally  a  "constitution" 
has  been  granted  and  elections  held.  But  the  Czar  still  remains 
autocrat  with  absolute  and  unlimited  powers,  he  still  governs 
in  the  interest  of  the  landlord  caste,  draws  most  of  the  ministers 
and  nearly  all  the  governors  and  generals  from  the  landlords, 
and  relies  almost  entirely  for  his  power  on  their  enthusiastic 
and  eager  support.  In  the  new  Duma  it  is  in  the  main  the 
landlords,  elected  under  the  unequal  election  law  not  by  the 
people  but  by  themselves,  that  vote  for  the  measures  of  the 
Czar.  As  for  centuries,  the  Czarism  and  the  landlord  caste 
stand  united  to  maintain  their  rule. 
/y  In  the  present  revolutionary  crisis  the  landlords  are  no  longer 
/ '  entirely  united,  but  none  favour  the  peasants'  programme. 
Practically  all  are  loyal  to  the  monarchy,  and  the  overwhelming 
majority  are  zealously  fighting  to  preserve  the  autocratic 
State.  They  are  divided  with  few  and  insignificant  exceptions 
into  three  parties:  the  extreme  reactionaries,  the  conservatives 
or  moderate  reactionaries,  and  the  moderate  liberals.  Perhaps 
the  most  influential  are  still  the  extreme  reactionaries  who 
demand  a  complete  return  to  the  old  order:  the  peasants  to  be 
held  on  the  level  of  serfs,  the  towns  and  industries  to  be  left  in 
the  hands  of  an  irresponsible  bureaucracy  limited  only  by  the 
influence  of  the  court  party,  which  is  and  must  remain  the  only 
possible  source  of  control  over  the  Governmental  machine. 
For  in  a  country  as  enormous  and  complex  as  modem  Russia, 
government  by  an  absolute  monarch  means  government  by 
the  court  party.  No  ruler  ever  lived  that  could  impress  his 
single  will  on  such  a  State. 

The  reactionaries'  programme  may  be  summed  up  in  the  single 
word  —  repression.  Let  Russia  be  bathed  in  blood  if  necessary 
until  the  last  spark  of  self-assertion  among  the  people  be 
destroyed.  Then  let  the  Czar  abolish  the  Duma  forever, 
revive  the  Orthodox  Church,  and  renew  the  persecutions  against 
Russian  dissenters,  Polish  Catholics,  and  Jews.  Finally,  let  a 
general  economic  reform  be  introduced  of  such  a  character  that 
none  but  those  sentimental  landlords  who  happen  to  have  some 
sentimental  attachment  to  their  estates  could  cavil  at  its  terms  — 
a  reform  that  in  turning  over  part  of  the  land  to  the  peasants 
would  leave  the  landlords  better  off  than  before,  and  let  the 


132  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

nation  pay  the  bill.  Let  the  Government  subsidise  the  so- 
called  "Peasants*  Bank"  and  let  that  bank  gradually  buy  up 
estates.  In  this  way,  former  Minister  of  Agriculture  Kutler 
himself  pointed  out,  the  prices  of  estates  stimulated  by 
Government  bidding  would  constantly  rise,  and  the  landlords 
would  secure  even  more  than  the  present  rack-rent  prices  for 
their  lands.  Kutler  was  so  outraged  at  this  proposition  made 
by  Count  Witte  in  1906  that  he  resigned  from  the  ministry  and 
became  the  chairman  of  the  second  Duma's  commission  on  the 
land  question  and  is  now  the  financial  expert  and  leader  of  the 
moderate  opposition  party. 

This  "reform"  would  cost  Russia  three  or  four  billion  rubles, 
about  as  much  as  the  Japanese  war.  I  was  actually  approached 
by  one  of  the  most  notorious  leaders  of  the  court  party  last  fall, 
Count  X.,  with  an  inquiry  as  to  my  opinion  about  the  possibility 
of  his  interesting  American  financiers  in  such  a  loan.  The 
count  had  heard  that  America  was  overflowing  with  money 
to  be  had  by  foreign  governments  on  good  security  at  3 
and  4  per  cent.  Might  not  America  lend  Russia  a  billion 
dollars  or  two  on  the  security  of  her  land?  The  count  was  of 
the  same  group  of  reactionaries  which  proposed  to  mortgage 
the  Russian  railways  to  some  Morgan  syndicate,  and  which 
actually  succeeded  in  putting  a  large  part  of  the  securities  of 
the  "  Peasants '  Bank"  in  English  hands,  with  hopes  of  continuing 
the  process. 

Until  his  "execution"  by  terrorists,  the  notorious  Jew-baiter, 
Count  Ignatiev,  was  the  leader  of  this  party  in  the  court. 
Pobiedonostzev,  head  of  the  church,  Trepov,  military  dictator 
of  St.  Petersburg,  and  the  other  chief  advisers  of  the  Czar  with 
few  exceptions  belonged  to  it  and  were  its  principal  support. 
Some  of  the  largest  landlords  in  the  country,  such  as  Prince 
Sheremetrieff,  also  a  power  in  the  court,  have  spoken  openly 
on  all  occasions  since  the  October  Manifesto  in  favour  of  a  return 
to  pure  Orthodoxy,  autocracy,  and  nationalist  persecution. 

This  party,  which  might  be  called  the  "old"  landlords' 
party,  is  "legal" — that  is,  allowed  to  hold  public  meetings 
and  demonstrations ;  while  all  the  large  parties  of  the  Duma, 
even  the  moderate  Constitutional  Democrats,  are  still  "illegal." 
Yet  the  basis  of  its  programme  is  violence,  illegal  governmental 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES  ARE  CZAR'S  ALLIES        133 

violence,  without  the  check  even  of  military  law,  where  govern- 
mental violence  is  effective,  and  wherever  it  is  not,  the  arming 
of  the  dregs  of  the  population  against  all  the  better  classes. 
It  is  this  class  that  has  hired  to  guard  their  estates  large  bands 
of  so-called  Cossacks,  often  really  only  raw  recruits  raked  even 
from  the  refuse  of  prisons.  One  noble  landlord  told  me  that  he 
had  instructed  his  ruffians,  as  soon  as  any  peasant  touched  any 
of  his  property,  to  bum  the  whole  thatch-roofed  village  down. 
This  was  in  fact  the  official  decision  reached  at  the  landlords' 
congress  as  to  the  action  to  be  taken  in  case  of  peasant  attack. 

But  why  does  this  landlord  party  give  itself  up  to  counter- 
revolutionary violence  rather  than  to  its  more  profitable  economic 
reform,  the  purchase  of  its  lands  by  the  Government  at  a  figure 
beyond  all  criticism?  The  cause  is  this.  First,  the  revolu- 
tionary propaganda  among  the  peasants  has  given  them  the 
hope  and  the  courage  to  demand  for  nothing  the  land  that  they 
have  already  repeatedly  purchased  with  their  sweat  and  blood. 
The  peasants  refuse  to  buy.  In  the  meanwhile  the  revolutionary 
movement  forces  some  of  the  landlords  to  flee  and  sell  their 
estates.  Second,  the  national  credit  is  so  low  that  the 
Government  could  scarcely  get  the  money  to  make  the  purchase. 
After  all  the  landlords,  even  the  most  violent,  are  business  men. 
If  by  fair  or  unfair  means  they  can  crush  the  revolution,  the 
field  of  exploitation  will  again  be  theirs.  They  do  not  have 
at  their  disposal  any  huge  corruption  funds  like  our  corporation 
magnates.  With  all  their  millions  of  acres  they  are  "land  poor." 
But  they  are  almost  in  complete  control  of  this  great  engine  of 
violence,  the  Russian  Government,  and  by  that  means  a  large 
part  among  them  still  hopes  to  achieve  their  ends. 

But  the  new  landlord  party  in  the  court  would  rather  follow 
the  well-tried  methods  of  the  Prussian,  Polish,  Austrian,  and 
Hungarian  proprietors.  They  do  not  hope  to  bring  about  a 
return  to  old  conditions.  They  do  not  want  to  abolish  the 
Duma,  but  to  dissolve  it  and  change  the  election  law  back  to 
the  Prussian  model,  as  was  recently  done  in  Saxony.  They 
knew  the  Duma  was  created  not  by  the  Czar  or  the  revolution, 
but  by  the  foreign  financiers,  and  that  therefore  it  cannot  be 
entirely  done  away  with.  They  wish,  not  more  violence,  but 
the  continued  application  of  the  present  measures  of  repression 


134  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

which  have  imprisoned  and  exiled  two  hundred  thousand  or 
three  hundred  thousand  people  during  last  year.  They  relied 
at  first  on  the  "constitution,"  which  allows  the  Czar's  "council" 
to  counteract  the  Duma  and  in  which  event  permits  the  Czar 
to  enact  the  laws  alone. 

With  the  enactment  of  an  election  law  that  left  three-fourths 
of  the  provinces  entirely  in  the  landlords'  hands,  and  gave  them 
nearly  all  the  rest  in  common  with  an  electoral  body  composed 
exclusively  of  the  wealthy  and  privileged  classes  of  the  towns, 
the  proprietors  were  inspired  with  a  new  life.  In  the  third 
Duma  the  majority  of  the  extreme  reactionary  group  of  more 
than  one  hundred  members,  and  of  the  moderate  reactionary 
group  of  150  members,  are  landlords,  while  a  third  group  that 
takes  a  position  between  the  two,  the  so-called  simple  rights, 
is  composed  almost  exclusively  of  landowners.  Of  these  three 
groups  the  moderates  hold  the  balance  of  power,  but  only 
when  the  democratic  and  popular  parties,  who  are  often  so 
disgusted  with  the  Duma  that  they  refuse  to  participate,  happen 
to  decide  to  vote  with  their  moderate  against  their  extreme 
enemies.  Otherwise  not  the  moderate,  but  the  centre  reaction- 
aries, control.  This  also  often  happens  when  the  less  moderate 
landlord  members  of  the  moderate  group  vote  with  their  more 
violently  reactionary  friends.  In  either  case  the  almost  ex- 
clusively landlord  party  controls  entirely  the  national  assembly. 
And  in  any  case,  even  when  the  landlords  don't  control,  they 
entirely  dominate  the  Duma. 

The  leader  of  this  moderate  reactionary  party  is  the  wealthy 
Count  Bobrinsky.  It  has  already  become  almost  the  official 
party  of  the  landlords'  congress.  Perhaps  to  a  greater  extent 
even  than  the  still  more  extreme  reactionaries  it  now  has  the 
sympathy  of  the  ministry  and  the  Czar,  and  it  is  in  close  alliance 
with  the  Octobrists  who  actually  propose  certain  moderate 
reforms.  Both  parties,  however,  are  agreed  that  the  landlords 
are  to  suffer  no  loss  in  whatever  transformation  is  to  come. 

The  least  influential  and  numerous  party  among  the  land- 
lords has  been  touched  with  the  liberal  ideas  of  the  middle 
classes  of  the  towns  and  feels  that  Russia  can  neither  go  back 
nor  stop  at  the  present  point  of  her  political  evolution.  They 
have  joined  in  the  movement  of  the  Constitutional  Democrats, 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES   ARE   CZAR'S   ALLIES       135 

the  Progressists  or  the  "Peaceful  Regenerators"  in  the  belief 
that  the  victory  of  liberalism  and  the  gradual  evolution  of  a 
moderately  democratic  state,  may  stop  the  revolution  and  save 
them  from  threatened  financial  ruin.  Some  have  formed 
the  so-called  "right  wing"  of  the  landlords'  party;  others 
have  formed  the  more  conservative  and  independent 
group  of  "Peaceful  Regeneration."  Such  are  the  Princes 
Dolgorukov,  Trubetzkoi,  and  Lvov,  Count  Heyden,  and  former 
Minister  Kutler.  Their  policy  seemed  the  wisest  for  the  land- 
lords and  at  first  promised  to  become  the  most  successful. 
Their  influence  on  the  Constitutional  Democrats  has  so  far 
moderated  the  latter 's  position  of  revolutionary  opposition  to 
the  Government  that  this  party  has  lost  what  Uttle  popularity 
it  formerly  enjoyed  among  the  people.  The  party  owed  its 
power  in  the  second  Duma  almost  entirely  to  a  few  hundred 
thousand  city  electors,  who,  under  the  unjust  election  law 
even  of  that  Duma,  controlled  almost  as  many  members  as  the 
twenty  million  peasants.  But  the  Constitutional  Democrats 
have  increased  their  influence  over  the  ministers  and  the  foreign 
financiers  as  fast  as  they  have  lost  it  with  the  people.  The  party 
that  in  an  early  congress  recognised  the  democratic  republic  as 
the  goal  toward  which  Russia  must  evolve,  later  defended 
the  monarch  in  the  Duma  against  all  disloyal  remarks.  Its 
leader,  Hessen,  has  declared  that  his  party  was  ready  to  com- 
promise both  on  the  great  political  issue,  on  equal  suffrage  and 
on  the  great  economic  issue,  the  handing  over  of  the  land  to 
the  people. 

Before  the  meeting  of  the  first  Duma  the  peasant  party 
leader,  Aladdin,  reminded  us  that  the  Constitutional  Democratic 
Party,  of  whom  a  considerable  majority  were  landlords,  could 
never  understand  or  satisfy  the  peasants*  demands.  The 
leaders  at  that  time  were  Petrimkevitch,  Roditchev  and  Nabo- 
kov, all  noblemen  and  landlords.  These  men  were  not  members 
of  the  avowedly  conservative  "right  wing"  of  the  party,  but 
of  the  centre.  Public  spirit  certainly  plays  a  prominent  part 
in  their  opinions.  Nevertheless  they  are  landlords,  and  so 
little  were  the  peasants,  their  tenants  and  labourers,  satisfied 
with  their  lukewarm  advocacy  of  the  peasants'  cause  in  the  first 
Duma,  that  they  decreased  their  number  to  a  half  in  the  second. 


136  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Many  landlords  joined  this  conservatively  liberal  party, 
but  the  peasants  turned  against  it  the  more  bitterly  as  the 
landlords  joined.  After  centuries  of  oppression  they  have 
little  confidence  in  a  party  half  composed  of  landlords  and 
fought  at  nearly  every  point  by  their  own  elected  representa- 
tives. A  generation  ago  they  had  a  great  experience  with  a 
reform  amended  and  carried,  if  not  originally  executed,  by 
the  landlord  class.  The  generation  they  have  lived  out  since 
has  proved  one  of  the  most  bitter  of  history. 

The  peasants  of  that  time  were  even  opposed  to  their  emanci- 
pation without  enough  land  to  keep  them  from  starvation. 
Warned  by  the  emancipation  and  pauperisation  of  the  peasants 
of  Prussia,  and  of  the  German  and  Polish  parts  of  Russia  a  few 
years  before,  they  feared  an  abject  dependence  on  the  landlords 
for  bread  more  than  they  hated  their  blows.  The  landlords,  on 
the  other  hand,  came  to  look  on  the  emancipation  even  with 
favour  before  it  was  actually  put  into  execution.  They  looked 
forward  to  the  institution  of  a  new  peasantry,  free  but  not 
provided  with  enough  land  for  their  food,  as  the  source  of  a 
cheaper  and  more  reliable  form  of  farm  labourers  than  the 
serfs.  Besides  this,  they  were  lured  by  three  immediate  economic 
rewards.  The  State  agreed  to  force  the  peasants  to  pay  both 
for  their  liberation  and  for  the  miserable  plots  of  land  that  the 
landlords  were  forced  to  leave  to  them.  In  addition  to  these 
immense  sums  in  cash,  the  landlords  took  the  woods  and  the 
better  half  of  the  pastures,  most  of  which  had  formerly  been 
used,  though  not  owned,  by  the  peasants.  The  opposition 
offered  by  the  landlords  was  merely  a  haggling  for  terms.  When 
the  great  measure  was  finally  accomplished  it  more  than  ful- 
filled the  landlords'  anticipations  and  the  peasants'  fears.  No 
sooner  was  it  put  into  effect  in  186 1,  than  a  thousand  peasant 
revolts  reached  an  importance  that  required  the  intervention 
of  military  force.  But  it  took  a  generation  for  this  landlords' 
reform  to  produce  its  maximtmi  of  peasant  ruin.  The  famine 
of  1906,  following  so  many  others,  has  brought  the  industry 
and  class  on  which  all  Russian  society  is  reared,  down  to  an 
economic  level  scarcely  higher  than  that  they  occupied  a 
century   ago. 

In  order  to  collect  the  new  dues  required  by  the  enormous 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES  ARE   CZAR'S   ALLIES       137 

sums  handed  over  to  the  landlords,  the  screws  of  servitude  to 
the  autocratic  State,  which  had  never  for  a  moment  been  relaxed, 
were  turned  on  harder  than  ever.  The  serfs'  bodies  were  taken 
from  the  hands  of  the  landlords  only  to  be  ttimed  over  to 
another  more  brutal  master,  the  State.  The  State  has  always 
been  the  worse  of  the  two  masters.  In  the  generation  that 
preceded  the  emancipation  Nicholas  I.  had  forced  a  large  part 
of  the  peasants  to  a  military  slavery  of  twenty-five  years  dura- 
tion and  to  the  most  inhuman  "discipline."  But  what  is  less 
known  is  that  this  same  terrible  discipline  was  applied  to  all 
the  miners  of  the  land,  to  the  post-office  and  all  the  lower 
employees  of  the  State.  And  what  is  still  more  important  is 
that  a  police  system  of  an  almost  equally  barbarous  severity 
was  also  applied  to  half  of  the  peasants  working  on  the  land; 
for  to  nearly  half  of  the  peasants  the  Czar  was  not  only  the 
great  arch  tyrant,  but  their  sole  master.  The  State  owned 
literally  not  only  the  army  which  furnished  servants  and  working- 
men,  the  miners,  the  State  employees,  but  also  nearly  one  half 
the  agricultural  serfs. 

By  the  "emancipation"  this  State  serfdom  was  simply 
extended  over  all  the  land.  The  police  were  given  a  power 
more  despotic  and  scarcely  less  immediate  than  that  formerly 
the  right  of  the  serf-owners.  New  servitudes  replaced  the 
old,  and  it  was  largely,  if  not  entirely,  on  the  landlords'  accoimt 
that  their  severity  was  increased.  To  make  easier  the  collection 
of  the  State  taxes  devoted  for  the  greater  part  to  paying  indem- 
nities and  making  loans  to  the  landlords,  and  to  prevent  the 
escape  of  the  landlords'  quarry  of  cheaper  labour,  the  emanci- 
pated peasant  was  again  fixed  to  the  land.  He  could  not  leave 
his  village  without  a  special  and  rarely  granted  legal  consent. 
When  the  first  rumblings  of  the  present  revolution  were  heard 
this  measure  was  abolished  "as  a  law"  only  to  give  place  to  an 
almost  exactly  similar  regulation  by  the  police.  To  make  the 
collection  of  taxes  more  sure  the  village  was  made  responsible 
as  a  whole  for  each  delinquent  tax-payer.  The  village  was 
then  given  the  right  to  inflict  corporal  punishment  or  forced 
labour  on  its  delinquent  members.  With  the  alternative 
hanging  over  their  heads  of  the  ruin  and  destruction  of  the 
village    by    savage    Cossacks,    the    villagers    seldom    hesitated 


I 


138  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

to  use  their  powers  under  the  eyes  and  direction  of  the  police. 
But  this  is  servitude.  What  more  is  there  to  serfdom  than 
corporal  punishment,  forced  labour,  and    fixture  to  the   soil? 

When  after  two  decades  the  State  found  it  could  beat  no 
more  out  of  the  pauperised  and  starving  peasant,  it  imposed  a 
new  and  immense  and  crushing  burden  of  indirect  taxes  that 
he  could  not  possibly  escape.  The  plan  worked  so  much  better 
than  the  other  that  these  taxes,  as  already  indicated,  have 
been  increased  from  year  to  year  until  the  wretched  peasant  is 
forced  to  pay  several  prices  for  his  plough,  the  petroleum  for  his 
lamp,  the  shirt  on  his  back  and  even  for  his  poor  luxuries, 
sugar  and  tea. 

Not  only  has  the  condition  of  the  people  long  ago  ceased 
to  improve,  but  agriculture  has  gone  backward  and  the  very  soil 
has  deteriorated.  The  average  peasant  farmer  is  to-day 
producing  less  per  acre  than  he  did  at  the  time  of  the  emanci- 
pation forty  years  ago  —  and  this  at  the  very  period  in  which 
agriculture  has  made  the  most  spectacular  strides  forward,  and 
the  American  farmer  is  getting  almost  twice  as  much  from  a 
day's  labour  as  before.  Year  after  year  the  peasant's  share  of 
land  is  growing  smaller,  his  horses  and  cattle  are  degenerating 
and  decreasing  in  numbers  from  under-nourishment.  The 
horses  are  already  only  about  half  the  weight  of  those  of  France. 
They  require  less  food,  but  even  taking  this  into  account  three 
of  them  still  get  scarcely  what  is  necessary  for  two.  Even 
the  men  are  habitually  underfed  —  according  to  a  Government 
report  to  the  extent  of  17  per  cent.  Farm  machinery  and 
even  harness  and  the  iron  needed  for  waggons  are  almost 
beyond  the  peasant's  reach,  and  are  often  replaced  by  devices 
of  wood  and  rope.  The  harrows  are  of  wood  and  the  ploughs 
penetrate  only  a  few  inches  into  the  soil.  So  when  a  dry  year 
comes  along  the  peasants  obtain,  as  a  recent  investigation  has 
shown,  only  half  the  crop  of  neighbouring  landlords  who  are 
able  to  follow  the  methods  of  modem  agriculture. 

The  frequent  famines  are  worse  in  years  of  drought,  but 
the  drought  is  only  a  secondary  cause  of  the  suffering.  With 
more  means  and  modem  methods  the  peasant  would  have  twice 
his  present  crop  even  in  dry  years,  and  in  good  years  he  would  be 
able  to  accumulate  enough  surplus  capital  to  last  him  until 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES   ARE   CZAR'S   ALLIES       139 

the  next  season,  as  do  our  farmers  of  the  arid  belt.  As  it  is, 
he  is  forced  by  every  drought  to  sell  his  farm  animals  and  even 
his  ploughs.  It  is  at  such  times  that  the  landlords  contract  for 
the  peasants'  labour  for  the  next  season,  in  return  for  a  little 
bread,  at  a  half  or  a  third  of  the  usual  starvation  wages.  The 
conditions  after  each  famine  increase  the  losses  and  sufferings 
of  the  next,  and  every  dry  year  brings  a  greater  harvest  of  death. 
The  annual  death  rate  is  already  forty  per  thousand,  twice  that 
of  any  other  civilised  land. 

The  landlords  do  not  profit  from  the  peasants'  starvation 
alone.  The  permanent  land-hunger  of  the  peasantry  has 
reached  such  a  point  that  the  landlords  are  able  to  obtain, 
for  land  no  more  productive  than  at  the  time  of  the  emancipation, 
four  and  five  times  as  much  rent  as  it  then  obtained.  The  lack 
of  land  is  so  great  that  the  peasants  are  employing  on  their  own 
land  only  one-fifth,  and  their  horses  only  one-third,  of  their 
possible  working  time.  To  ward  off  starvation  the  peasants 
must  either  work  for  the  landlord,  or  pay  him  a  rent  that  gives 
him  as  much  profit  as  he  could  extort  by  direct  exploitation  of 
pauper  labour. 

So  the  landlords  have  prospered  while  the  peasants  have 
starved.  Year  after  year  they  are  sending  out  more  and  more 
grain  from  the  country,  while  the  peasants  and  their  farm  animals 
are  more  and  more  underfed.  In  1906,  the  great  famine  year, 
Russian  landlords  exported  enough  grain  to  feed  all  of  Russia's 
starving  millions.  In  some  famine  years,  as  in  1905,  the  exports 
were  scarcely  lowered  at  all. 

The  landlords  have  prospered  not  only  because  of  the 
conditions  created  at  the  time  of  the  "emancipation,"  but  also 
by  their  steady  influence  over  the  Czars  since  that  time.  All 
the  laws  favour  the  landlords.  The  labour  contract  with  the 
"free"  peasants  has  been  turned  into  a  farce.  The  landlord, 
or  any  of  his  family,  have  a  right  to  fine  their  labourers  at  their 
discretion  not  only  for  neglect  of  work  but  even  for  lack  of 
respect.  But  even  with  this  the  landlords  were  not  satisfied. 
Disagreeable  and  expensive  quarrels  with  the  peasants  about 
wages  and  rents  continued  to  arise.  So  a  new  official  was 
instituted  whose  special  business  it  is  to  settle  all  disputes 
between   landlords   and    peasants.      This    "land    official"    has 


I40  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

become  more  hateful  to  the  peasants  than  were  the  worst  of 
their  former  landlord  proprietors.  He  is  responsible,  not  to 
local  authorities,  but  directly  to  St.  Petersburg  — and  is  inac- 
cessible to  any  except  influential  persons.  He  is  backed  by  the 
full  autocratic  power  of  the  Czar,  prison,  the  knout,  Siberia,  and 
Cossack  invasion.  Furthermore,  the  Czar's  ukase  requires  that 
he  himself  shall  be  a  nobleman  of  rank,  which  is  in  most  cases 
tantamount  to  a  landlord! 

These  new  officials,  surrounded  and  courted  by  landlords, 
have  made  full  use  of  their  powers.  Villages  have  revolted  by 
the  hundreds,  only  to  be  beaten  and  shot  into  subjection  by 
the  savage  Cossacks,  to  have  their  houses  burned  and  their 
women  outraged  as  in  the  days  of  Tamerlane.  When  terror- 
stricken  villages  have  answered  the  despots'  orders  with  loyal 
arguments  about  the  true  will  of  God  and  the  Czar,  it  has 
almost  become  the  custom  for  these  gentlemen  to  answer, 
"  I  am  your  God  and  your  Czar." 

Landlord  influence  has  governed  Russia  from  the  institution 
of  serfdom  centuries  ago,  to  the  institution  of  the  hundreds  of 
landlord  sub-despots  in  the  last  decade,  and  to  the  institution  of 
the  landlords*  Duma  of  the  present  moment.  The  peasants  are 
not  again  likely  to  leave  their  destinies  in  the  hands  of  any  party 
in  which  the  landlords  exert  an  important  power.  They  showed 
in  all  three  elections  that  they  are  more  than  ever  attached  to 
their  own  party  and  its  programme.  The  immense  price  the 
peasants  have  already  paid  in  beatings,  imprisonment,  exile, 
starvation  and  violent  death;  the  hopes  that  have  been  newly 
raised;  the  evident  justice  of  their  demands  for  a  controlling 
voice  in  the  nation's  parliament  and  for  the  early  possession  of 
the  land,  though  evidently,  starving  as  they  are,  they  cannot 
pay  for  it  and  will  not  be  able  to  for  many  years  to  come;  and 
above  all  the  results  that  their  revolutionary  movement  has 
already  brought  to  their  cause  — these  things  have  decided  all 
the  parties  that  represent  them  not  to  await  anything  even 
from  the  most  liberal  part  of  their  former  masters,  and  not  to 
wait  indefinitely  for  the  installment  of  an  indefinite  portion  of 
their   demands. 

Even  the  Constitutional  Democrats  concede  that  fear  of 
revolution  is  still  a  leading  motive  with  the  Government,  as 


PEOPLE'S   ENEMIES   ARE   CZAR'S   ALLIES       141 

it  was  at  the  time  of  the  emancipation.  Soon  after  the  peasant 
disorders  of  1902  and  1903  the  Czar  abolished  corporal  punish- 
ment and  the  confinement  of  the  peasantry  to  their  native 
village,  as  normal  institutions  of  peasant  life.  After  the 
disorders  of  1905  the  Czar  gave  the  peasants  a  large  proportion 
of  the  seats  in  the  new  Duma,  remitted  half  of  their  direct 
taxes  to  the  State,  shortened  the  term  of  service  in  the  army, 
and  bettered  the  food  of  the  soldiers  and  increased  their  pay. 
After  the  disorders  of  1906  the  peasants  were  given  part  of  the 
crown  lands,  they  were  admitted  for  the  first  time  to  equality 
with  other  citizens  before  the  courts  and  the  law,  and  they  were 
given  for  the  first  time  the  same  rights  as  others  over  their  own 
land.  During  1907  there  were  few  disturbances  and  no  great 
reforms. 

If  we  remember  that  this  same  movement  of  violent  resistance 
of  the  peasants  has  procured  them  more  respect  from  the  police, 
has  driven  away  some  of  the  more  obnoxious  landlords,  raised 
wages  and  lowered  rents,  and  if  we  observe  that  this  movement 
has  become  better  organised,  more  sure  and  less  bloody  each 
year,  we  may  realise  why  the  peasants  are  clenching  their 
teeth  and  holding  up  their  heads  as  never  before  in  a  thousand 
years. 

The  peasants  are  full  of  hope ;  but  even  if  the  situation  of  the 
Russian  people  is  desperate,  if  it  is  hopeless  for  the  present 
generation,  this  is  because  of  great  historical  causes  over  which 
this  noble  nation  has  had  no  control.  And  the  chief  of  these 
is  not  the  Czarism  with  its  dependent  army  of  Cossacks,  officials, 
and  police,  but  the  existence  of  a  deep-rooted  and  time-honoured 
governing  caste,  the  owners  of  the  white  slaves  of  the  last 
generation,  a  caste  whose  interests  are  against  those  of  the 
nation  and  diametrically  opposed  to  the  regeneration  the  nation 
demands. 

The  majority  of  the  first  Duma  has  just  been  on  trial  for 
having  provoked  the  disobedience  of  the  people.  The  words 
of  one  of  the  people's  own  representatives  addressed  to  the 
judges  and  the  Government,  is  the  judgment  of  the  Russian 
nation  on  the  third  Duma. 

"We  see  in  you,"  said  Chersky,  "in  this  the  greatest 
political  trial  of  the  century,  the  defenders  of  the  interests 


^ 


142  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

of  Stoly pine's  one  hundred  and  thirty  thousand  landlords,  and 
the  enemies  of  the  law  and  the  people." 

This,  then,  is  the  final  alignment  of  the  Russian  nation  — 

(on  the  one  side  the  Czar,  the  court,  the  Government  officials, 
the  officers  of  the  army,  and  the  one  hundred  and  thirty  thousand 
landlords;,  on  the  other  the  one  hundred  million  peasants, 
^the  working  people  and  nearly  all  the  middle  class. 
s  The  power  may  long  remain  with  the  Government.  Justice 
'    is  with  the  nation. 


PART  THREE 

Revolt 


CHAPTER  I 

THE    RUSSIAN    PEOPLE A    MYSTERY 

THE  Czar  and  his  ministers  continue  to  assure  the  world 
that  the  real  Russian  people,  the  hundred  million  peasants^  / 
are,  and  always  have  been,  contented,  loyal  and  devoted^ 
subjects.  This  has  been  the  favourite  slander  in  the  long 
campaign  of  defamation  of  its  own  people  that  constitutes 
one  of  the  worst  crimes  of  the  Government.  We  know  some 
of  the  infamies  of  Czarism,  but  there  are  many  of  which  we  are 
entirely  ignorant.  Because  of  the  rigid  censorship  in  Russia 
of  all  the  news,  the  systematic  bribery  of  many  foreign  news- 
papers, and  the  favourable  misrepresentation  of  officials  on  all 
occasions,  it  has  been  impossible  to  get  at  reliable  and  general 
information  on  the  very  subjects  that  are  fundamental  to  all 
others  — the  actual  conditions  of  the  villages  where  four-fifths 
of  the  people  live,  the  present  development  of  the  peasants,  their 
attitude  to  the  Czar,  the  Church,  the  officials,  the  landlords 
and  the  revolution. 

With  so  little  reliable  knowledge  we  have  been  at  the  mercy 
of  the  imscrupulous  official  statements.  Before  the  peasants 
had  an  opportunity  to  voice  themselves  in  their  national 
parliament,  these  official  statements  had  succeeded  in  implanting 
in  the  consciousness  and  literature  of  foreign  nations  a  vague 
and  indefinite,  but  none  the  less  obnoxious,  picture  portraying  the 
peasants  as  a  dull  and  indolent  race,  ignorant,  hard-drinking, 
fanatically  religious  and  stupidly  devoted  to  the  Czar.  Natu- 
rally we  have  had  small  sympathy  with  a  people  we  believed 
to  have  so  little  manhood  and  so  little  love  of  freedom  as 
humbly  to  submit  to  the  curse  of  Czarism. 

In  Russia  itself  the  Czar's  defenders  have  carried  their  attacks 
on  the  peasants*  character  so  far  as  to  reduce  them  to  absurdity. 
As  patriotic  Russians  they  pretended,  of  course,  that  most  of 
\he  shameful  characteristics  they  attributed  to  the  great  mass 

145 


146  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

of  their  countrymen  are  after  all  virtues,  and  that  the  key  to 
the  peasants'  psychology,  the  greatest  of  all  virtues,  is  — self- 
renunciation.  This  is  "the  highest  expression  possible  to  the 
human  individual"  since  it  makes  of  him  the  perfect  subject 
of  those  divine  Russian  institutions,  the  absolute  Czarism  and 
the  "changeless"  Church.  According  to  the  professional 
Russian  patriots  or  Slavophils,  whatever  is  Russian  is  right. 
But  the  peasants  of  Russia  are  both  poor  and  illiterate.  Are 
their  poverty  and  lack  of  education  also  part  of  the  "highest 
expression  possible  to  the  human  individual"?  The  late  head 
of  the  Holy  Church  could  well  give  an  authoritative  answer, 
since  he  was  also  the  most  venerated  adviser  of  Alexander  III. 
and  of  the  present  Czar.  That  terrible  old  man  Pobiedonostzev 
opposed  general  education,  newspapers,  and  everything  else 
that  might  develop  the  slightest  spirit  of  freedom.  He  carried 
his  ideas  to  their  logical  conclusion  and  fearlessly  announced 
to  a  world  that  still  refuses  to  believe  its  ears  and  does  not  yet 
realise  the  full  monstrosity  of  his  doctrine,  that  "inertia  is  the 
fulcrum  of  progress"  and  that  "poverty,  lowliness,  deprivation, 
and  self-denial  are  the  true  lot  of  men." 

Such  are  the  ideas  that  have  ruled  and  guided  the  present 
Czar. 

This  "official  character"  of  the  peasants,  as  I  have  said, 
has  been  so  long  and  stoutly  repeated  as  to  have  been  accepted 
and  passed  on  by  foreign  writers  on  Russian  conditions.  The 
three  volume  work  of  Leroy-Beaulieu  is  undoubtedly  the  most 
important  foreign  study  of  "The  Empire  of  the  Czars."  By 
a  scientific  and  historical  method  the  author  has  covered  every 
phase  of  Russian  life,  from  the  geography  of  the  country  to  its 
latest  political,  economic,  and  cultural  development.  But  he 
has  refused  to  place  himself  at  the  only  standpoint  that  can 
lead  to  a  true  understanding,  that  of  the  Russian  people.  He 
has  failed  to  distinguish  between  that  part  of  Russian  life  that 
emanates  from  the  spirit  and  natural  evolution  of  the  Russian 
people,  and  that  other  alien  part  that  has  been  forced  on  it  by 
an  alien  Government  which  owes  its  origin  and  maintenance 
either  to  foreign  power  and  influence  or  to  the  stem  military 
necessity  of  defending  the  most  exposed  country  of  Europe 
against  the  Turks  and  Tartars. 


THE    RUSSIAN  PEOPLE— A  MYSTERY  147 

This  famous  "scientific"  but  unsympathetic  observer,  attrib- 
uting the  barbarism  of  the  Government  to  the  whole  nation, 
has  branded  the  Russian  people  with  the  same  vulgar  libels 
that  are  current  among  those  totally  ignorant  of  the  land.  To 
him  Russia  is  still  essentially  mediaeval,  the  people  mystical, 
fatalistic,  inert.  "  Modem  as  Russia  is  if  we  look  to  the  external 
side  of  her  civilisation,  to  her  army  and  bureaucracy,"  he  says, 
"she  is  mediaeval  still  in  the  manners  and  spirit  of  her  people." 

This  brief  sentence  is  yet  such  a  conglomeration  of  truth, 
untruth,  and  half-truth  that  I  can  scarcely  correct  it,  and  to 
bring  out  all  its  inaccuracies  I  must  offer  a  substitute.  I  am 
certain  that  the  author  in  penning  such  a  perversion  of  the 
reality  was  thinking  of  the  only  side  of  Russia  with  which  his 
book  shows  any  deep  acquaintance,  namely  its  government. 
The  sentence  should  read  "Modem  as  the  Russian  Government 
is,  if  we  look  at  the  external  side  of  her  army  and  bureaucracy, 
the  governing  caste  is  still  mediaeval  in  its  opinions  and  spirit." 
Certainly  the  Russian  army  has  a  modem  organisation  and 
armament,  certainly  the  Russian  prisons  and  police  are  among 
the  most  highly  developed  in  the  world  —  this  organized 
violence  is  indeed  the  very  raison  d'etre  of  the  autocratic  form 
of  government.  It  is  alone  to  a  certain  aptitude  and  success 
in  modernising  the  means  of  holding  the  people  in  subjection 
that  it  owes  its  existence.  But  this  is  the  end  of  the  virtues 
of  the  ruling  caste.  The  whole  history  of  Russia  and  of  the 
present  revolution  shows  that  it  is  the  spirit  and  opinions 
of  the  army  of  officers  and  Government  officials  that  are  reaction- 
ary and  even  mediaeval. 

Perhaps  the  most  dangerous  of  all  the  criticisms  of  Russia 
is  that  which  attaches  some  fundamental  deficiency  to  the  race 
itself.  Leroy-Beaulieu,  who  is  careful  to  make  no  direct  attach? 
on  the  Slavic  peoples  as  such,  nevertheless  characterises  thQ 
peasant  of  to-day  as  inert  and  lacking  in  creative  power.  But* 
what  permanently  oppressed  and  starving  people  ever  showed 
much  sign  of  creative  power?  Are  not  the  East  Prussian 
peasants  of  to-day,  though  infinitely  less  poverty-stricken, 
both  inert  and  reactionary,  an  accusation  that  can  scarceVy 
be  made  against  the  revolutionary  and  Socialistic  Russian 
peasants.     Have  not  the  Russian  peasants  adapted  themselves 


148  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

quickly  to  every  variety  of  modern  life  and  industry  that  was 
opened  to  them?  Are  not  former  peasants  working  success- 
fully in  many  instances  the  most  complicated  agricultural 
machinery,  railway  locomotives,  the  most  delicate  tools?  In 
fact  half  of  the  five  or  six  million  working  people  in  Russia's 
modem  industries  are  former  peasants. 

Furthermore,  Leroy-Beaulieu  refers  continually  to  **  mysti- 
cism," "fatalism,"  and  "passive  endurance"  as  the  chief 
traits  of  the  peasant's  character.  Yet  may  not  such  passive 
qualities,  as  far  as  they  really  do  exist,  be  simply  the  temporary 
results  of  oppression?  Mysticism  may  arise  from  the  very 
keenness  of  the  desire  for  a  rational  explanation  of  life  on  the 
part  of  those  to  whom  knowledge  is  denied;  fatalism  may  come 
from  the  intensity  of  frustrated  longing  for  a  better  regime; 
passive  endurance  from  the  futility  of  resistance  to  a  stronger 
physical  power.  Leroy-Beaulieu  himself  acknowledged  that 
he  had  only  spoken  of  negative  qualities,  for  he  found  it  impos- 
sible at  the  time  he  wrote  to  give  an  estimate  of  the  peasant's 
"actual  creative  power."  It  is  precisely  this  positive  creative 
power  that  we  want  to  understand. 

But  this  racial  prejudice  appears  much  more  clearly  in  more 
recent  and  less  scientific  books  than  the  one  to  which  I  have 
been  referring,  works  which  are  nevertheless  widely  circulated 
and  have  had  on  the  whole  an  immense  influence.  An  Ameri- 
can book  that  appeared  just  before  the  Russian- Japanese  War 
is  typical.  The  author,  Senator  Beveridge,  is  known  to  every- 
body in  America  and  his  views  are  sure  to  have  had  their  con- 
verts. Among  the  most  striking  traits  of  the  Slavic  race  he 
finds  fatalism,  indolence,  stolidity,  inertia,  slowness,  lethargy, 
conservatism,  subservience,  and  lack  of  initiative.  Passing 
from  the  people  to  the  general  spirit  of  the  nation  the  writer 
finds  the  soul  of  Russia  in  the  voice  of  Pobiedonostzev.  But  on 
•this  man's  death  the  foreign  press  characterised  him  rightly 
as  the  best-hated  man  in  all  Russia. 

The  voice  of  Pobiedonostzev  and  of  the  officers,  officials, 
landlords,  bankers,  merchants,  and  manufacturers,  to  whpm 
this  author  expressly  acknowledges  his  indebtedness  for  the 
information  he  gathered  during  the  few  weeks  of  his  stay  in 
European   Russia,   naturally   supplied   him   with   his  view   of 


THE  RUSSIAN  PEOPLE— A  MYSTERY  149 

the  nation's  ideals.  The  author  found  that  his  interlocutors, 
whose  identity  he  betrays  when  he  speaks  of  the  "ordinary 
Russian,"  "business  man,  banker,  or  what-not,"  "appears  to  be 
devoted  to  his  Czar  and  Russian  institutions,"  and  that  "the 
Czar  is  beloved  by  the  great  body  of  his  subjects  with  an  adoring 
affection  not  accorded  to  any  other  ruler."  Finally  he  con- 
cluded that  the  Slav  thinks  that  autocratic  Czarism  and  the 
Orthodox  Chtirch  are  the  " foundation  stones  of  civilisation." 
Unfortunately,  many  persons  still  believe  that  the  Russian 
masses  are  devoted  to  their  Czar  and  Church  in  spite  of  the 
plentiful  evidence  to  the  contrary  in  the  recent  revolutionary 
events.  I  shall  deal  with  this  fallacy  in  an  early  chapter.  But 
in  the  meanwhile  I  shall  show  the  superficial  character  of  the 
broad  assertions  of  this  typical  observer.  The  writer  quotes 
without  criticism  or  contradiction  the  statement  of  a  landlord 
that  the  emancipation  was  granted  by  the  "liberal"  Czar  "at 
the  expense  of  the  Russian  nobility."  The  truth  is  that  the 
chief  cause  of  the  present  revolution  is  the  crushing  burden  of 
taxes  laid  on  the  peasants  to  enable  the  Government  to  pay 
the  nobility  not  only  an  ample,  but  often  even  an  exorbitant, 
price  for  their  losses  both  of  land  and  the  uncompensated 
service  of  the  serfs.  This  same  informant  also  told  our  writer 
that  the  ignorant  peasants  had  not  not  known  how  to  use  their 
liberty  and  had  even  refused  to  use  iron  or  steel  ploughs.  The 
truth  is  that  the  peasants  had  used  iron  ploughs  even  under 
serfdom,  and  as  to  the  steel  ones  they  do  not  employ  them 
at  the  present  day  simply  because  they  cannot  afford  the  price. 
It  is  certainly  not  true  that  the  peasant  has  ever  refused  to 
use  any  important  agricultural  implement  within  his  purchasing 
power.  Finally,  this  landlord  informed  our  friend  that  the 
peasants  had  soon  forgotten  the  severities  of  serfdom  and 
remembered  only  "the  comparatively  trivial  inconveniences" 
of  the  present  time.  I  shall  deal  with  these  comparatively 
trivial  inconveniences  later.  I  can  find  no  words  for  the  ignor- 
ance, carelessness,  or  indifference  of  a  person  writing  on  the 
Russia  of  to-day  for  a  necessarily  ignorant  audience,  who 
reprints  this  phrase  with  every  sign  of  approval  and  without 
giving  anywhere  a  single  fact  or  statement  to  counteract  the 
singularly    false    and   misleading   impression   it    creates.     The 


ISO  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

present  sufferings  of  the  peasants  may  be  less  than  those  at  the 
time  of  serfdom,  but.  they  are  not  trivial  in  comparison  with 
those  of  any  period  through  which  humanity  has  passed,  and 
to  speak  of  them  as  inconveniences  is  a  monstrous  understate- 
ment of  the  truth. 

The  reader  of  Senator  Beveridge's  book  knows  that  this 
writer's  judgment  has  been  condemned  out  of  his  own  mouth. 
Writing  just  before  the  war  with  Japan  he  predicted  in  his 
book  that  there  was  no  probability  in  international  politics 
greater  than  the  permanency  of  the  Russian  occupation  of 
Manchuria.  Writing  after  the  outbreak  of  the  great  and  bloody 
labour  disturbances  of  1902  and  1903,  which  he  even  mentions, 
he  says  that  "there  have  been  no  considerable  labour  riots," 
that  labour  is  submissive  and  there  is  no  labour  question.  The 
year  before  the  outbreak  of  the  revolution  he  belittles  what 
disturbances  had  occurred  and  expected  nothing  of  a  very 
serious  character. 

Another  book  is  worth  mentioning  here  as  a  sample  of  the 
malicious  statements  that  have  been  circulated  over  the  world 
as  the  truth.  During  the  famine  of  1906-7  Mr.  Howard  P. 
Kennard,  M.  D.,  an  English  "humanitarian,"  was  in  Russia 
to  assist  the  Government  and  the  landlords  in  relieving  the 
wholesale  starvation  and  disease  they  themselves  had  brought 
on.  His  book,  "The  Russian  Peasant,"  he  claims  to  be  based 
on  his  own  personal  observation;  however,  in  his  preface  he 
confesses  himself  indebted  to  such  acknowledged  friends  of 
Nicholas  II.  and  enemies  of  the  Russian  people  as  the  French- 
man Leroy-Beaulieu,  the  Englishmen  Sir  Donald  Mackenzie 
Wallace,  and  the  courtier  Prince  Nicholas  Sherebatov,  one  of 
the  most  hated  men  in  all  Russia. 

Mr.  Kennard  unmistakably  suggests  that  the  peasants  have 
not  progressed  since  the  time  of  Ivan  the  Terrible.  He  describes 
a  national  peasant  festivity,  which  he  claims  is  typical,  as  an 
"unbridled  bestial  orgy."  He  finds  that  "natural  laziness 
and  addiction  to  drink  have  brought  the  peasant  to  the  pass 
he  is  in  to-day,"  says  that  the  peasant's  belly  is  his  god,  tljat 
he  does  not  wish  to  improve  his  condition,  and  that  they  do 
not  even  wish  "to  learn  to  farm  in  any  other  way  than  that 
which  has  been  handed  down  to  them  by  their  forefathers." 


THE  RUSSIAN   PEOPLE  — A  MYSTERY  151 

Mr.  Kennard  declares  that  the  "Russian  peasant,  devoid  of  all 
capabilities  in  the  matter  of  reading  and  writing,  has  a  mind 
and  imagination  which  are  ripe  for  the  reception  of  all  trash 
that  Church,  State,  those  desirous  of  influencing  him  for  good 
or  evil,  may  pour  into  his  poor  besotted  brain."  Our  savant 
friend  then  proceeds  to  state  "that  the  only  subject  he  knows 
about  is  the  subject  of  devils,"  and  that  the  peasant's  first 
thought  every  morning  is  "what  will  the  Domovoi  (household 
demon)  do  to-day?"  In  brief,  Mr.  Kennard  finds  the  peasant 
"utterly  unable  to  understand  what  is  meant  by  education, 
progress,  or  culture." 

Finally  he  simis  up  the  peasant  in  this  manner:  "The  peasant 
emerges  from  the  ordeal  to-day  but  the  semblance  of  a  man 
—  a  thing  with  half  a  mind,  a  mortal  without  attributes;  a  mor- 
bid being  blessed  with  life  alone,  and  cursed  with  ignorance 
and  imbecility  until,  in  the  twentieth  century,  his  melancholy 
has  become  innate." 

All  of  these  statements  of  Mr.  Kennard  are  about  as  false 
and  vicious  as  any  calumnies  concerning  a  whole  people,  or 
a  large  majority  of  any  people,  could  well  be.  His  book  must 
remain  a  classic  example  of  the  stream  of  poison  and  hatred 
that  pours  into  some  hearts  in  the  presence  of  the  ugliness 
of  human  misery.  I  have  no  hope  of  driving  the  writer  who 
penned  such  words  to  shame.  But  I  do  expect  to  show  that, 
badly  educated  as  the  peasants  are,  a  very  large  portion  of 
them  have  more  than  a  modicum  of  education  and  that  they 
are  thirsting  for  more,  that  far  from  being  devoted  to  devils 
the  peasants  have  a  kind  of  natural  instinct  for  independent 
religious  and  ethical  ideas;  and  I  expect  to  show  that  nothing 
but  a  readiness  to  accept  prejudiced  statements,  or  a  natural 
blindness  to  truth  while  in  its  very  presence,  or  a  deeply  ingrained 
hatred  of  mankind,  could  have  led  any  person  who  has  spent 
several  months  among  the  Russian  farmers  to  find  in  them 
merely  a  creature  ranking  somewhere  between  man  and  beast. 

I  trust  it  is  clear  to  the  reader  that  the  Russian  people  have 
enemies  in  all  directions,  even  among  those  who  claim  the  most 
loudly  to  be  their  friends;  and  I  trust  that  he  will  read  what 
follows  unswayed  by  the  self-evident  prejudices  so  widely 
circulated  by  writers  like  those  referred  to  above.    This  im- 


152  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

partiality  is  important,  not  alone  because  of  the  immense 
interest  attaching  to  the  peasant,  but  also  because  he  has  so  long 
remained  an  unknown  quantity,  even  to  the  most  sympathetic 
and  unbiased  minds. 

The  real  character  of  the  peasant  has  remained  a  mystery 
until  to-day.  He  constitutes  the  greatest  unknown  element 
of  the  white  race.  He  is  just  for  this  reason  the  most  interest- 
ing human  problem  of  our  time.  If  his  nature  is  undeveloped 
it  is  in  the  same  proportion  unfixed  and  unspoiled  —  in  other 
words,  the  nattire  of  the  generic  man.  He  will  come  to  his 
majority  in  the  twentieth  century  more  freed  from  tradition 
than  our  own  pioneers  in  the  nineteenth.  The  Russian  revolution, 
bound  sooner  or  later  to  end  in  his  favour,  will  not  only  make 
him  master  of  half  Europe  and  Asia,  and  revolutionise  the 
relations  of  the  world  powers;  it  will  decide  the  fate  of  every 
democratic  movement  on  the  continent,  and  give  a  new  inspi- 
ration to  the  international  movement  for  economic  quality. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  RUSSIAN  PEOPLE THEIR  TRUE  CHARACTER 

BUT  at  last  the  mystery  surrounding  the  peasant,  his  low 
reputation,  are  beginning  to  be  dissolved.  Since  the 
first  and  second  Dumas,  in  which  the  peasants*  feelings  and 
opinions,  kept  dumb  for  centuries,  were  for  the  first  time  publicly 
voiced,  we  have  begun  to  get  a  glimpse  of  the  true  character  of 
the  peasants,  of  their  true  attitude  toward  the  Government. 
The  people's  own  chosen  representatives  have  pointed  out  that 
the  peasants  are  and  always  have  been  in  a  rebellious  state,  that 
the  history  of  the  Russian  peasantry  has  been  that  of  an 
unending  series  of  revolts,  and  that  the  only  reason  a  revolution  yL 
has  not  yet  overturned  the  Government  is  the  terrible  brute- 
power  of  the  half-million  semi-foreign  Cossacks  who  guard  the 
Czar.  It  appears  in  contradiction  to  everything  the  Govern- 
ment has  claimed  that  the  peasant  is  a  democrat  in  everything 
and  a  Socialist  in  regard  to  the  land,  that  he  is  almost  without 
race  prejudice,  and  that  he  is  liberal  and  even  independent  in  his 
religious  views.  There  can  no  longer  be  the  slightest  doubt  of 
these  claims;  the  two  elections  are  substantiated  by  tens  of 
thousands  of  village  meetings,  endorsing  the  action  and  attitude 
of  the  people's  representatives,  and  by  thousands  of  cases  in 
which  the  peasants  have  gone  to  imprisonment  and  death  for 
supporting  their  political  faith. 

It  seems  that  the  spiritual,  if  not  the  physical,  resistance  of 
the  people  has  risen  proportionately  to  the  imreason,  injustice, 
and  violence  of  the  ruling  caste.  Instead  of  devotion  to  the 
Czar,  there  reigns  in  the  mind  of  the  peasant  a  supreme 
indifference  to  the  spirit  of  his  laws  and  an  almost  equal  indif- 
ference to  the  authority  of  his  Church.  In  this  the  Russian 
is  removed  at  once  from  the  subserviency  of  the  German  peasant 
before  his  officials,  and  that  of  the  Southern  Italian  before  his 
priests. 

The  story  of  the  origin  of  the  Russian  Church  gives  the  best 

153 


154  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

symbol  of  its  position  to-day.  Before  their  "conversion"  to 
Christianity,  the  ancient  Slavs  had  a  very  simple  and  flexible 
form  of  belief.  They  were  not  idolaters  or  worshippers  of  many 
gods,  they  had  no  priests,  and  their  cult  was  limited  to  that  of 
Svarog,  the  god  of  heaven  and  light,  certainly  a  rather  spiritual 
deity  who  might  well  symbolise  the  universe  and  its  Hfe.  The 
Emperor  Vladimir,  however,  descendant  of  one  of  the  Norse 
conquerors  of  the  land,  was  impressed  with  the  glory  of 
Constantinople  and  the  Greek  Church,  and  proceeded  quite  in  the 
scientific  spirit  to  send  a  commission  to  study  it  and  the  other 
Christian  churches.  The  commission  returned  overcome  by  the 
beauty  of  the  singing,  temples,  and  service  of  the  Greeks.  They 
declared  that  they  found  no  gladness  among  the  Bulgarians,  and 
no  beauty  in  the  temples  of  the  Germans,  but  among  the  Greeks 
they  found  such  beauty  that  they  knew  not  how  to  tell  of  it, 
they  no  longer  knew,  they  said,  "whether  they  were  in  heaven  or 
on  earth . "  "  It  is  there , "  they  reported , '  *  that  God  dwells  among 
men,  and  their  service  surpasses  that  of  any  land."  So 
influenced  by  the  beauty  of  the  Greek  Church's  temples  and 
service,  and  in  return  for  the  hand  of  a  princess  of  the  Eastern 
Empire,  Vladimir  was  baptised,  and  gave  up  his  promising 
design  of  capturing  Constantinople,  which  if  accomplished 
might  well  have  transformed  the  history  of  Europe  and  the 
world.  No  sooner  was  he  Christianised  than  with  the  true 
gesture  of  a  Czar  he  ordered  his  people  led  to  the  rivers  and 
baptised.     Thus  was  Russia  converted  to  the  Greek  Church. 

In  the  same  spirit  a  law  among  the  statutes  to-day  requires 
every  Russian  citizen  who  does  not  belong  to  some  other 
"recognised"  creed  to  attend  at  least  once  every  year  the 
Orthodox  service.  Innumerable  other  enactments  of  the  kind 
have  followed  without  interruption  since  the  time  of  Vladimir's 
baptism,  and  naturally  have  had  no  spiritual  effect.  To-day 
it  is  the  pleasure  taken  in  the  service  and  singing  that  attracts 
the  peasant;  the  priest  does  not  as  a  rule  enter  seriously  into 
his  life.  The  priest  is  nearly  always  paid  in  kind  for  each  service 
and  so  is  economically  dependent  on  the  poorest  peasants,  who 
often  find  they  can  make  a  bargain  better  in  proportioii  to 
the  amount  of  vodka  they  can  persuade  him  to  drink.  The 
priests  also  are  forced  to  serve  as  the  political  agents  of  the 


THEIR   TRUE   CHARACTER  155 

Government,  and  this  the  peasants  do  not  fail  to  feel  and  resent. 
For  instance,  the  priests  received  full  instructions  as  to  what 
they  were  to  say  and  do  during  the  elections  for  the  Duma. 
The  outraged  peasants  replied  by  ceasing  to  go  to  church,  by 
refusing  to  do  any  labour  for  the  priests,  and  even  in  some 
cases  by  proposing  through  the  village  meetings  to  take  away 
their  land.  Subjected  economically  to  the  peasants,  and 
politically  to  the  police,  even  the  relatively  small  number  of  the 
priests  that  possess  the  attributes  to  assume  moral  leadership 
are  usually  without  the  power  to  do  so. 

In  what,  then,  does  the  peasant's  loudly  proclaimed 
Orthodoxy  consist.?  In  the  first  place  he  has  shown  an  uncon- 
querable tendency  not  to  be  Orthodox  at  all,  but  to  do  his  own 
religious  thinking.  When  two  centuries  and  a  half  ago  one  of 
the  Czars  appointed  a  commission  to  study  again  the  original 
forms  of  the  Greek  Church,  which  were  supposed  to  have 
degenerated,  the  new  ceremonies  that  were  enacted  were  met 
by  a  variety  of  passive  resistance  as  obstinate  and  successful 
as  the  world  has  ever  seen.  The  passive  resisters,  the  "Old 
Believers,"  were  satisfied  with  the  "Slavic"  Church  and  the 
forms  of  service  they  themselves  had  helped  to  develop.  The 
genius  of  the  people,  working  through  the  Church,  has  developed 
an  original  and  truly  beautiful  music  that  is  a  real  source  of 
inspirational  delight.  The  people  loved  these  forms  as  they 
were,  they  considered  they  had  a  God-given  right  to  them.  So 
they  obstinately  refused  these  Czar-imposed  changes  — refused 
them  though  persecuted  and  tortured  relentlessly.  The  Czars, 
on  the  other  hand,  have  realised  that  one  freedom  leads  to 
another,  and  have  claimed  with  equal  obstinacy  until  to-day 
that  God,  having  entrusted  them  with  the  absolute  mastery 
of  the  peasants*  bodies,  has  also  made  them  tyrants  of  their  souls. 

A  large  portion  of  the  peasants  still  go  to  the  Czar's  church, 
for  in  the  sombre,  isolated  and  often  starving  villages  of  the 
forests  and  the  steppes,  the  most  beautiful  or  least  ugly  spot  is 
the  church,  and  the  most  interesting  occasion  is  its  service. 
But  they  do  not  obey  the  Czar's  priests  and  they  have  developed 
a  morality  of  their  own  making.  Another  large  part  have  not 
been  deterred  by  the  most  terrible  persecution  from  creating 
a  religion  also  after  their  own  ideas.     The  tendency  to  break 


iS6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

away  altogether  from  the  priests  is  general.  A  large  part  of 
the  "Old  Believers,"  especially  those  who  settled  in  outlying 
districts  where  priests  were  difficult  to  obtain,  decided  finally 
to  do  without  them  altogether.  The  idea  spread  all  over  the 
country  and  of  course  led  these  "priestless"  ones,  as  they  are 
called,  to  do  their  reUgious  thinking  for  themselves.  The 
result  is  perhaps  as  large  a  body  of  sincere  and  rationalistic 
religious  thinkers  as  is  to  be  found  among  the  people  of  any  land. 

But  the  religious  evolution  did  not  stop  here.  It  has 
continued  and  grown  with  the  increase  of  education  and  travel, 
and  with  the  new  life  and  new  occupations  of  the  people  in  this 
already  half -modernised  country.  Along  with  a  political 
revolution  as  profound  as  the  French,  is  going  on  a  popular 
religious  reformation  comparable  only  to  the  peasants* 
movements  of  Luther's  time.  The  peasants  have  created 
systems  of  new  religious  belief  on  an  entirely  independent  basis. 
The  subtlety,  simplicity  and  dignity  of  these  beliefs  has  charmed, 
and  even  won,  many  of  their  observers.  It  is  enough  to 
remember  that  Tolstoi  has  confessed  his  deep  indebtedness  to 
both  Molokani  and  Doukhobors.  Though  these  numerous 
sects  are  still  in  progress  of  growth  and  development,  their 
adherents  are  already  numbered  by  the  millions. 

The  Government,  of  course,  is  at  present  straining  every 
nerve  to  repress  and  conceal  these  schisms  and  to  strengthen 
in  every  possible  way  the  Orthodox  Church.  Persecutions 
relaxed  for  a  year  or  more  after  the  Czar's  famous  promises  of 
religious  liberty,  are  every  day  being  renewed.  The  warfare 
between  the  people's  genuine  religious  instinct  and  the  hated 
State  Church  is  bound  to  go  on  undiminished. 

The  peasants  have  shown  as  much  character  in  their  attitude 
toward  the  laws  of  the  Czar  as  toward  his  Church.  The 
thousands  of  bloodily  suppressed  revolts,  and  the  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  cases  of  rebellious  peasants  who  have  languished 
away  their  lives  in  prison  and  exile,  are  only  the  lesser  mani- 
festation of  the  hatred  for  the  Government.  Where  the  people 
have  been  literally  beaten  into  submission  by  the  Cossacks,, and 
this  has  happened  at  one  time  or  another  in  most  of  the  villages, 
there  has  arisen  a  spirit  of  passive  resistance  which  has  often 
ended  by  a  complete  victory  over  the  Czar. 


THEIR   TRUE   CHARACTER  157 

The  Czars  have  always  been  able  to  exact  from  the  peasant 
a  terrible  tribute  of  taxes  and  recruits.  They  have  been  able 
to  tie  the  peasants  to  their  villages  and  to  prevent  their  escape 
from  these  exactions,  but  when  they  have  attempted  to  interfere 
with  the  villagers'  internal  affairs,  the  imperial  will  has  been 
shattered  against  the  people's  own  ideas  of  right  and  wrong. 
Especially  when  they  have  tried  to  upset  the  peoples'  own  laws 
of  property,  it  has  been  the  autocrats  who  have  had  to 
surrender.  The  peasants  as  a  whole  have  not  yet  permitted 
the  Czars  to  subvert  their  laws  of  inheritance  or  their  equitable 
system  of  distributing  the  land. 

The  hundred  thousand  villages  where  the  mass  of  the  Russian 
people  live  are  in  their  internal  affairs  so  many  little  immemorial 
republics.  At  the  present  moment,  as  at  the  earliest  dawn 
of  history,  they  are  ruled  by  a  pure  spirit  of  democracy  not 
only  in  political  but  in  economic  affairs.  A  large  part  of  the 
peasant  land  is  village  property  used  by  all  the  villagers  in 
common ;  the  rest  is  divided,  and  from  time  to  time  redistributed, 
according  to  the  ideas  of  equity  of  the  whole  village.  An 
estimate  is  made  of  each  family's  claims,  either  at  the  death 
of  its  head,  or  at  the  time  of  a  general  census,  and  the  family 
is  allotted  a  certain  proportion  of  the  village  ploughed  land. 
But  no  person  is  ever  allowed  to  claim  a  right  to  a  particular 
piece  of  soil,  he  has  merely  a  right  to  a  certain  quantity.  There 
is  no  such  thing  as  title  and  private  ownership  of  the  land  itself, 
since  it  is  not  a  product  of  individual  labour  but  a  "gift  of  God." 
A  family  is  allowed  possession  of  a  definite  piece  of  the  land 
long  enough  only  to  secure  the  family  the  fruits  of  its  labour  -^ 
that  is,  for  the  three  years'  rotation  of  crops  which  prevails  — 
then  triennial  redistribution  of  land  takes  place.  This  is  why 
the  peasant  deputies  in  the  Duma  can  say  with  perfect  truth 
that  the  peasants  do  not  want  the  land  to  buy  and  sell,  but 
merely  to  plough.  They  want  more  land  in  order  that  they  may 
have  more  work.  They  have  never  in  their  own  experience 
known  what  rents  or  unearned  profits  from  land  ownership  are. 

The  village  community,  since  it  controls  the  peasant's  means 
of  livelihood,  has  an  unlimited  power  over  his  existence.  But 
this  power  is  as  democratic  as  it  is  unlimited.  All  the  peasants 
live  in  the  village,  and  are  infinitely  more  intimately  related 


iS8  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

to  one  another  than  a  country -people  living  on  isolated  farms. 
They  work  together  and  are  always  under  one  another's  eye. 
The  spirit  is  profoundly  social,  and  has  been  made  all  the  more 
so  by  the  village  ownership  of  the  land.  The  democracy  is 
therefore  profound  and  rests  on  the  feeling  of  full  social  and 
economic  equality,  which  is  the  only  sure  foundation  of 
democracy  in  any  land.  The  village  meetings  concern  themselves 
principally  with  questions  of  the  chief  and  only  great  business 
of  every  member,  the  winning  of  the  daily  bread.  And  so  the 
equality  of  these  tens  of  thousands  of  little  communities  has 
gone  deeper  than  any  other  equality  we  know,  because  it  rests 
on  a  social  and  not  merely  on  a  political  democracy. 

There  is  no  conflict  between  this  village  government  and  its 
citizens.  The  villages  do  not  elect  temporary  masters  to 
rule  over  them,  like  many  so-called  democratic  communities. 
The  starosta,  or  head  of  the  village,  is  in  very  truth  the  servant 
of  the  community,  and  remains  its  servant  in  spite  of  all  the  St. 
Petersburg  Government  can  do  to  make  of  him  an  authority  of 
the  despotic  order  always  so  necessary  to  a  Czarism.  The 
Czar  has  enacted  that  the  starosta  shall  receive  a  good  salary 
and  be  immune  from  taxes  and  corporal  punishment;  the 
Government  has  endowed  him  with  enough  insignia  of  office 
to  buy  the  souls  of  the  nobility  of  some  European  countries. 
But  the  village  assembly  considers  him  as  its  servant  and  gives 
its  orders  at  every  meeting  as  to  its  secretary  or  clerk. 

The  real  business  of  the  village  is  concentrated  in  the  assembly 
itself,  and  there  are  few  villagers  that  do  not  take  an  active 
part.  There  is  nothing  more  immediate  or  important  in  their 
lives.  Conducted  on  a  scale  sufficiently  small  to  enable  all  the 
elements  of  the  vital  questions  under  discussion  to  be  under- 
stood by  everybody,  the  village  meeting  has  come  to  form  a 
part  and  parcel  of  the  peasant's  existence.  Public  life  is  not  a 
thing  apart  as  in  some  externally  democratic  countries  where 
private  business  overshadows'  public  affairs  and  politics  are  a 
mask  for  private  interests  and  the  greed  for  office.  "As  soon 
as  public  service  ceases  to  be  the  principal  business  of  the  ^citi- 
zens," said  Rousseau,  "the  state  is  already  near  to  ruin." 
Of  all  modem  communities  the  Russian  villages  are  perhaps 
farthest  from  this  calamity. 


THEIR   TRUE   CHARACTER  159 

In  some  cases  there  is  already  complete  communism  —  that 
is,  both  common  ownership  and  common  cultivation  of  the  soil, 
a  system  that  allows  the  advantages  not  only  of  every  modem 
method  of  agriculture  but  of  large  scale  production  and  the  use 
of  machinery  that  no  small  farmer  can  afford.  Peasant 
companies  (artels)  often  buy  or  rent  a  piece  of  land,  work  it 
together,  and  share  expenses  and  profits  according  to  a  pre- 
arranged plan.  In  all  the  villages  the  peasants  manage  their 
cattle  in  common,  cut  their  hay  in  common,  and  in  many  cases 
they  own  a  common  granary.  A  large  part  of  the  peasants,  and 
the  most  progressive  and  enlightened  experts  on  Russian 
agriculture  as  well,  hope  and  believe  that  this  cooperation  in 
production,  a  natural  outgrowth  of  the  prevalent  social  spirit, 
will  so  develop  as  to  make  it  possible  that  common  property 
in  land  will  remain  the  basis  of  Russian  agriculture  and  of 
Russian  society.  The  peasants*  party  in  the  Duma  wishes 
each  province  to  be  allowed  to  adopt  communism  if  it  desires. 
This  privilege  would  certainly  be  widely  accepted  and  would 
result  in  the  abolition  of  private  property  in  two-thirds  of  the 
land. 

The  Czar's  Government  has  looked  with  suspicion  enough 
at  this  village  nucleus  of  democracy  and  Socialism.  A  gener- 
ation ago  Alexander  II.  was  deliberating  over  the  village 
commune,  or  mir.  The  dangers  to  the  Czarism  of  maintaining 
such  a  democratic  institution  were  obvious.  But  for  several 
generations  the  Czarism  has  been  caught  between  two  equal 
dangers  — one  due  to  the  education  and  development  of  the 
people  within  the  country,  and  another  due  to  industrial 
progress  of  the  rival  nations  without.  If  the  village  commune 
were  to  be  dissolved  to  give  place  to  private  property,  this 
would  do  away  with  the  immemorial  village  republics;  but  it 
would  also  hasten  the  economic  development  of  Russia  by 
creating  two  new  classes,  landless  working  people  furnishing 
cheap  labour,  and  a  rural  middle  class  to  furnish  capital  and 
business  enterprise.  The  development  of  capitalists  and  cheap 
labour  might  in  turn  enable  Russia  to  develop  her  industry,  to 
accumulate  wealth  and  to  build  up  an  army  and  navy  fit  to 
resist  those  of  other  modem  lands.  But  such  a  development 
seemed  to  many   of  the  highest  officials   highly   undesirable. 


j6o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Both  working  people  and  small  capitalists  are  democratic 
everywhere,  and  it  was  they  that  had  brought  about  the 
European  revolution  of  1848.  So  Alexander  decided  to  keep 
the  mir.  He  preferred  a  democratic  village  to  a  free  nation, 
a  pauperised  people  to  a  constitution. 

But  the  same  Czar  also  used  all  his  power  to  maintain  another 
class,  whose  interests  were  in  sharpest  contrast  to  the  peasants' 
commune.  He  had  made  the  landlords  free  their  peasant 
serfs,  but  he  allowed  them  to  take  away  part  of  the  peasants' 
land,  while  he  forced  these  famishing  agriculturists  to  take  on 
a  new  and  crushing  burden  of  taxes  and  payments  of  indemnity 
for  their  own  freedom.  The  result  was  that  the  peasants 
starved  more  and  more  as  the  years  went  on,  agriculture  stag- 
nated and  even  deteriorated,  it  became  impossible  to  beat 
more  taxes  out  of  the  villagers,  industry  was  without  country 
purchasers,  and  the  State  finances  were  hopeless.  The  finance 
ministers,  as  we  have  seen,  had  introduced  every  manner 
of  taxation,  had  protected  industry,  established  a  gold  currency, 
built  railways,  and  borrowed  billions  of  rubles  from  abroad; 
but  the  Counsel  of  State,  during  Count  Witte's  ministry,  was 
forced  to  confess  the  failure  of  all  these  measures  to  reach 
their  chief  aim  and  to  declare  that  the  Government  was  "power- 
less for  the  reorganisation  of  the  life  of  the  peasants  and  assist- 
ing agricultural  industry."  Read  for  ** peasants"  the  "mass 
of  the  people"  and  for  "assisting  agricultural  industry"  "pre- 
serving from  ruin  the  economic  foundation  of  Russian  society." 

The  Czars  had  no  hope  for  their  people.  But  the  condition 
could  scarcely  be  worse,  and  they  began  almost  automatically 
to  reverse  their  older  policies.  So  finally  the  present  Czar 
decided  to  abandon  the  mir.  If  there  were  no  chance  to  save  the 
mass  of  the  people  from  starvation,  perhaps  he  might  aid  a 
few  of  the  peasants  to  establish  an  agricultural  middle  class 
on  the  ruin  and  pauperisation  of  the  rest. 

Minister  Stolypine  now  proposes  to  give  the  last  stroke  to  the 
village  commune  —  to  allow  every  starving  peasant  the  right 
of  selling  his  land,  and  to  assign  the  communities'  political 
powers  to  other  higher,  newer,  and  less  dangerous  local  authorities. 
It  is  doubtful  if  the  villages  will  surrender  their  political  power, 
more  than  doubtful  if  they  will  allow  a  few  of  their  number 


THEIR   TRUE   CHARACTER  i6i 

the  right  to  buy  up  the  land  of  the  rest.  For  the  popularity  of 
communal  property  has  been  growing,  and  the  well-defined 
Socialist  and  revolutionary  politics  of  the  peasant  representa- 
tives in  the  second  Duma  leave  no  further  doubt  of  the  Socialistic 
principles  Russia  will  some  day  apply  to  her  land.  The  great 
peasant  institution,  the  Socialistic  commune,  will  have  furnished 
the  basis  of  the  future  Russian  State. 

The  peasants,  then,  show  every  sign  of  creative  power,  in  religion, 
in  politics,  in  economic  institutions.  They  are  independent  and 
positive  in  their  individual  thought  and  feeling,  social  and 
democratic  in  public  life.  Have  they  also  the  practical  qualities 
that  will  bring  the  revolution  to  a  successful  conclusion?  We 
can  be  certain  of  at  least  two  of  the  characteristics  most  essen- 
tial to  a  rapid  and  sound  development,  open-mindedness  to 
modem  ideas,  and  the  spirit  of  imity  among  themselves.  They 
are  open-minded  with  regard  to  national  institutions  because 
Russia  has  had  no  national  traditions  except  those  imposed 
by  the  violence  of  the  Czar.  The  peasants  have  neither  assisted 
in  the  law-making  nor,  except  under  coercion,  obeyed  the  law. 
They  are  progressive  also  because  conditions  have  united  them 
by  a  close  material  and  spiritual  bond  with  two  other  classes 
that  are  as  progressive,  if  not  more  so,  than  the  corresponding 
classes  of  any  other  country  —  the  working  people  and  the 
professional  element. 

In  Russia,  as  in  no  other  land,  the  city  working  people  and 
the  country  people  form  a  single  whole.  The  city  working- 
men  were  drawn  only  lately  from  the  country.  Most  of  them 
are  in  the  habit  of  returning  to  the  country  from  time  to  time; 
many  go  back  for  every  harvest,  for  often  the  city  work,  service, 
driving,  and  so  on,  is  less  important  to  them  than  their  interest 
in  the  village  property.  Furthermore,  this  current  from  city 
to  country  is  increased  by  the  tens  of  thousands  of  rebellious 
workingmen  the  Government  sends  back  to  their  villages. 
All  these  workingmen  have  brought  back  with  them  the  revo- 
lutionary ideas  of  the  towns. 

The  educated  classes  have  succeeded  in  establishing  the 
most  cordial  and  intimate  relations  with  the  people  of  both 
cities  and  villages.  It  is  as  if  the  whole  country  were  an  end- 
less series  of  social  settlements  in  which  the  settlement  residents 


i62  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

had  not  merely  sacrificed  a  few  luxuries  and  pleasures,  but  had 
accepted  the  risk  of  imprisonment,  exile,  and  execution.  In 
all  the  great  popular  organisations  of  the  revolution,  the  intel- 
ligentsia, or  educated  and  professional  classes,  have  played  a 
predominant  r61e,  have  been  gladly  accepted  by  the  people, 
and  have  acted  side  by  side  with  the  people's  leaders,  who 
often  owed  their  education  in  turn  to  that  same  class.  The 
political  parties  are  governed  almost  exclusively  by  these 
tried  and  cultivated  democrats.  The  still  more  typically  popular 
organisations,  the  Peasants*  Union,  the  Railway  Union,  the 
Councils  of  Labour  Deputies,  were  also  managed  almost  entirely 
by  men  of  imiversity  training  and  by  self-educated  peasants 
and  workingmen.  From  the  greatest  professors  and  lawyers 
of  the  land  down  to  the  village  doctors  and  school  teachers, 
there  has  been  one  common  movement  toward  the  people  — 
a  movement  not  only  for  union  against  despotism,  but  for 
bringing  to  the  people  all  the  great  ideas  and  aspirations  of 
civilisation.  The  culture  of  this  educated  class  being  in  many 
respects  superior  to  that  of  other  courftries  —  as  for  instance, 
in  knowledge  of  foreign  languages,  literature,  and  history,  and 
in  the  sincerity  of  their  social  theories  —  the  people  secured  a 
corresponding  advantage.  Through  this  movement  some  of 
the  greatest  ideas  and  highest  aspirations  of  humanity  have 
gained  common  circtdation  among  the  masses.  Many  Russian 
peasants  and  workingmen  are  now  seriously  and  intelligently 
interested  in  foreign  history,  literatur-e,  economics,  and  politics. 
The  politics  and  economics  of  their  own  land  are  put  into  terse 
and  readable  form  by  the  "intellectuals,"  spread  over  the  country 
in  a  sea  of  leaflets  and  illegal  or  short-lived  newspapers,  and 
literally  devoured  by  the  people  of  every  village  and  workshop 
in  the  empire. 

Thus  there  has  arisen  a  great  unity  among  the  masses, 
including  the  educated  and  professional  class.  On  the  other 
side  and  in  favour  of  the  Czarism,  are  only  the  landlords,  offi- 
cials and  army  officers  and  those  who  accept  their  pay.  Neither 
the  bitterness  and  class  hatred  that  characterised  Germany, 
nor  the  selfishness  of  the  extreme  individualism  that  was 
created  by  early  conditions  and  still  characterises  the  United 
States,  have  ever  existed  in  Russia,  to  plant  in  the  minds  of 


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P4     rt 


A    SOUTHERN   TYPE   OF   PEASANT 
From  a  painting  by  Rcpin 


THEIR   TRUE   CHARACTER  163 

the  people  an ti- social  or  non- social  instincts  that  may  take 
generations  to  eradicate.  The  origin  of  the  Russian  people,  its 
common  struggle  against  those  united  powers  of  evil  that  call 
themselves  the  Czarism,  and  above  all  the  situation  in  which 
it  finds  itself  to-day,  have  joined  together  to  create  the  strongest 
social  and  the  first  Socialistic  nation  of  history. 

It  is  not  only  the  psychology  of  the  people,  it  is  the  present 
situation  itself,  that  has  created  this  Socialistic  sentiment. 
For  whatever  the  causes  of  the  revolutionary  crisis,  the  crisis 
itself  demands  and  requires  a  social  solution.  The  situation 
is  in  sharpest  contrast  to  that  which  prevailed  at  the  birth  of 
our  nation.  The  United  States  of  America  were  formed  by 
a  democratic  population  whose  problem  was  to  people  a  vast 
and  uninhabited  land.  The  United  States  of  Russia  will  be 
formed  by  a  democratic  nation  whose  problem  will  be  to  provide 
a  vast  people  with  land.  Our  internal  problem  was  purely 
political,  to  protect  individuals  from  the  violent  encroachments 
of  other  individuals.  Most  economic  and  social  problems  were 
left  in  the  individual's  hands,  and  out  of  the  control  of  society. 
The  result  has  been  the  most  developed  individualism  the  world 
has  known.  The  Russian  people,  on  the  contrary,  are  confronted 
with  a  problem  that  is  at  once  social,  economic,  and  political. 
The  poUtical  problem  is  to  do  away,  not  with  the  violence  of 
individuals,  but  with  that  of  the  State.  The  economic  problem 
is  the  common  need  for  all  classes  of  the  nation  to  lift  to  the  level 
of  the  times  the  methods  of  the  national  industry  of  agriculture 
and  the  conditions  of  the  whole  agricultural  class.  As  the 
great  mass  of  the  farms  and  farmers  are  at  present  on  the  same 
low  level,  this  economic  problem  is  not  only  common  to  all, 
but  one  in  the  solution  of  which  society  as  a  whole  can  and  will 
certainly  take  an  active  part.  The  great  social  problem  has  to 
do  with  the  present  and  future  division  of  the  land.  If  the 
Diuna  were  to  allow  unrestricted  private  property,  free  trade 
in  land  under  the  present  conditions,  the  penniless  and  needy 
peasants  would  be  at  the  mercy  of  such  among  them  as  had 
a  little  capital  at  hand  with  which  to  buy  the  others'  land. 
The  peasants  are  painfully  conscious  of  this  danger,  and  have 
declared  at  innumerable  village  meetings  that  the  right  of 
private  property  would  mean  the  still  further  impoverishment. 


i64  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  absolute  pauperisation,  of  the  many  for  the  benefit  of  a 
new  landlord  class.  Some  are,  therefore,  in  favour  of  the  reten- 
tion of  the  old  form  of  property,  the  village  commune,  adapted 
to  new  needs.  All  are  for  special  laws  restricting  the  rights 
of  the  individual  owner  and  possessor,  and  all  are  in  favour  of 
the  absolute  subordination  of  private  interests  as  the  foundation 
of  the  new  law  and  the  Nationalisation  of  the  Land. 

The  social  spirit  goes  to  unimagined  lengths.  It  has  no 
sombre  exceptions  for  persons  of  foreign  race.  The  same 
feeling  that  holds  individuals  and  classes  together  has  bound 
into  one  whole  all  the  races  of  the  enormous  empire.  Finns 
and  Tartars,  with  their  separate  religions,  have  lived  for  centu- 
ries in  friendly  neighbourliness  with  the  Russian  peasants  all 
over  the  country.  In  certain  sections,  German  and  Jewish 
colonies  have  been  treated  in  a  cordial  and  neighbourly  manner 
for  a  similar  period.  The  White  Russians  and  South  Russians 
have  lived  for  generations  in  harmony  with  Letts,  Lithuanians, 
and  Poles.  The  Siberian  settlers  have  gotten  along  with 
innumerable  Asiatic  tribes,  as  we  failed  to  get  along  with  our 
Indians,  and  as  the  English  failed  to  get  along  with  their  native 
subjects.  When  the  Czars  have  decided  to  undertake  a  special 
persecution  and  robbery  of  some  subject  race  —  like  the  Jews 
—  they  have  not  been  able  to  get  the  least  support  from  the 
people  on  racial  grounds,  and  have  had  to  resort  to  the  same 
purely  religious  pretexts  with  which  they  persecute  the  purest 
Russian  sects.  The  few  popular  persecutions  of  the  Jews  on 
Russian  territory  have  been  the  work  not  of  Russians,  but  of 
Poles  or  of  Roumanians,  like  Krushevan.  This  absence  of 
race  feeling  is  perhaps  the  last  and  severest  test  of  the  pro- 
fundity, the  completeness,  of  the  social  spirit  that  binds  together 
this  great-hearted  people. 

It  is  not  merely  a  new  race  or  a  new  nation  that  is  coming  into 
being  in  the  great  territory  that  stretches  half-way  round 
the  world,  from  the  Pacific  to  the  Black  and  Baltic  seas.  The 
new  country,  casting  aside  all  governmental  violence  within 
and  invincible  to  external  attack  in  its  freedom  and  immensity, 
will  be  held  together  only  by  the  common  social  problem  and 
the  common  social  idea.  By  its  freedom  and  power  it  will  be 
constituted  a  great  and  almost  decisive  influence  for  peace 


THEIR   TRUE   CHARACTER  165 

among  the  nations.  An  essentially  new  people  on  the  stage 
of  the  world,  in  possession  of  a  boundless  and  almost  undeveloped 
land,  unhampered  by  traditions,  accustomed  to  economic 
equality,  and  permeated  with  the  social  spirit,  the  Russians 
are  hkely  soon  to  become  the  chief  inspiration  of  the  other 
nations,  a  position  recently  lost  after  having  been  held  for  a 
century  by  the  United  States. 


CHAPTER   III 


HOW    THE    PEASANTS    LIVE 


THOUGH  Russia's  hundred  million  agriculturists  are  free 
from  the  self-imposed  shackles  of  accepted  tradition, 
both  of  Church  and  of  State,  yet  they  are  by  no  means  free  from 
limitations  forced  upon  them  by  their  own  meagre  lives,  by 
exhausting  and  almost  unremunerated  labour,  and  by  the 
calamities  through  which  they  have  had  to  pass.  To  see  a 
little  way  into  the  lives  of  these  so  little  understood  people  — 
to  know  concretely  the  daily  work  that  makes  them  what  they 
are  —  to  understand  the  present  meaning  of  their  recent  history, 
and  even  more  to  know  just  what  they  are  thinking  to-day 

—  to  know  how  far  they  have  advanced  in  their  feeling  about 
coming  social  changes,  how  far  they  dare  to  pit  themselves  against 
the  Government,  and  what  are  the  qualities  by  which  they  expect 
to  win  and  hold  the  power  over  the  greatest  empire  in  the  world 

—  it  is  necessary  not  only  to  hear  what  sympathetic  and  edu- 
cated Russians  have  to  say,  but  it  is  also  necessary  to  move 
among  the  peasants  themselves.  So  after  having  interviewed 
in  the  towns  numerous  experts  on  Russian  agriculture  and  the 
condition  of  the  peasantry,  I  went  out  among  the  villages  armed 
with  introductions  to  doctors,  school  teachers,  and  other  devoted 
persons  of  education  living  there,  and  also  to  certain  of  the  more 
intelligent  peasants  who  were  able  to  put  me  in  touch  with  the 
rest.  I  visited  half  a  himdred  villages,  scattered  from  the 
northern  forests  of  Kostroma  to  the  southern  steppes  of  Poltava, 
from  near  the  Asiatic  frontier  to  the  former  Polish  province 
of  Kiev,  and  talked  with  several  hundred  peasants  of  every 
condition  and  every  class.  I  made  it  a  practice  to  verify  all 
statements  made  to  me;  I  endeavoured  always  to  avoid  ^he 
prejudices  of  a  given  moment  or  a  given  place;  and  I  checked 
by  personal  observations  the  statistics  I  had  obtained  in  the 
provincial  capitals,  and  then  in  turn  I  had  my  observations 

i66 


HOW   THE   PEASANTS   LIVE  167 

criticised  by  the  doctors,  teachers,  agricultural  experts  and 
statisticians  who  are  giving  their  lives  to  the  betterment  of 
coimtry  conditions.  In  this  business  I  spent  half  of  the  summer 
of  1906,  while  the  revolutionary  movement  was  still  in  swing, 
and  half  of  the  summer  of  1907,  when  the  revolution  had  greatly 
subsided  and  the  peasants  were  hoping  to  overturn  the  Czarism 
only  after  a  desperate  struggle  that  would  perhaps  not  even 
begin  in  its  full  intensity  for  several  years. 

A  mention  of  some  of  the  circumstances  attending  these 
trips  will  afford  an  insight  into  the  internal  condition  of  Russia. 
The  Government  is  trying  to  quarantine  the  villages  from  all 
contact  with  the  world's  intelligence  by  means  just  as  strin- 
gent as  those  taken  to  quarantine  them  from  Asiatic  cholera 
or  any  pest.  Very  many  of  the  city  persons  to  whom  I  was 
directed,  although  by  no  means  active  revolutionists,  had  just 
been  hurried  off  by  the  officials  to  be  entombed  in  prisons  or 
exiled  to  the  arctic  deserts,  merely  because  they  had  visited 
some  village,  or  happened  to  be  acquainted  with  a  few  peasants. 
Most  of  the  courageous,  progressive  element  had  indeed  dis- 
appeared on  my  second  circuit  of  the  provincial  towns.  Those 
that  remained  often  did  all  they  could  to  discourage  me  from 
the  very  idea  of  visiting  any  Russian  village.  Indeed,  it  is  so 
difficult  and  rare  for  Russians  to  be  allowed  to  travel  about 
among  the  peasants  that  on  my  return  from  the  first  journey  in 
1906  I  was  eagerly  interviewed,  even  by  some  who  have  devoted 
their  whole  lives  to  a  study  of  the  peasant  question.  Occasionally 
it  happened  that  I  would  have  to  spend  several  days  in  a  pro- 
vincial capital  of  some  one  himdred  thousand  people,  with  the 
best  introductions,  before  any  one  would  dare  to  suggest  the 
name  of  some  friend  in  the  country  to  whom  I  might  talk 
without  endangering  his  safety.  In  one  province,  after  remain- 
ing several  days,  I  had  finally  to  abandon  entirely  the  idea 
of  visiting  any  of  the  several  thousand  villages  it  contained. 

In  this  great  quarantine,  probably  the  lack  of  sufficient 
railways  and  the  almost  total  lack  of  good  roads  does  more 
automatically  to  keep  the  villages  and  towns  separated  from  one- 
another  than  all  the  Government  can  accomplish  with  its 
oppression.  Whenever  I  had  to  wait  in  a  railway  station  I 
foimd  dozens,   sometimes  hundreds,   of  peasants  lying  about 


i68  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

on  the  hard  floors  waiting  for  trains,  where  often  they  had 
waited  for  days.  Sometimes  the  trains  were  late,  but  usually 
the  delay  was  because  the  Government  did  not  take  pains  to 
furnish  sufficient  cars  for  such  very  common  passengers.  This 
is  doubtless  a  matter  of  much  less  consequence  to  the  peasant 
than  the  fact  that  the  cars  he  needs  to  transport  his  products 
are  not  on  hand,  and  the  further  fact  that  the  railways  are  not 
able  to  take  the  peasants*  products  to  market  but  rather  serve 
the  largest  estates  and  industries  or  are  used  merely  for  strategic 
military  ends. 

Away  from  the  railways  conditions  are  infinitely  worse. 
Of  course  there  are  no  roads  whatever  in  the  sense  of  paved 
roadways.  Everywhere  there  is  naturally  some  effort  to 
drain  off  the  most  serious  mud  holes  and  to  bridge  over  other- 
wise impassable  streams,  but  even  this  work  is  so  badly  done 
that  the  roads  are  often  utterly  impassable  for  many  weeks, 
while  in  many  sections  the  bridges  are  in  a  passable  condition 
only  in  that  part  of  the  year  when  they  are  strictly  necessary. 
This  condition  is  partly  due  not  only  to  the  poverty  of  the 
peasant,  who  in  the  Province  of  Simbirsk  spends  only  half  a 
cent  a  head  per  year  on  the  repair  of  roads,  but  also  partly  to 
the  Government  which  allows  the  landlords  to  have  an  absolute 
monopoly  of  the  local  government  and  even  to  pay  no  taxes 
whatever  for  such  purposes.  It  is  unnecessary  to  attempt  a 
calculation  of  how  many  hundred  million  rubles  such  a  state 
of  the  roads  costs  this  miserably  poor  country  that  can  so  ill 
afford  such  waste. 

In  the  great  majority  of  the  Russian  provinces  I  did  not 
see  any  isolated  farm-houses.  The  villages,  where  live  the 
peasants,  are  separated  by  many  miles  of  forests  or  fields. 
Usually  the  first  objects  that  struck  the  eye  before  entering 
a  village  were  a  large  number  of  windmills.  These  are  nearly 
everywhere  constructed  on  the  same  primitive  pattern  and 
entirely  of  wood,  apparently  as  they  were  a  hundred  years  ago. 
It  seems  that  the  milling  of  flour  on  an  economic  scale  has 
scarcely  begun  in  most  of  the  villages.  It  is  also  to  be  noted 
that  the  windmills  are  owned  and  operated  in  common  by 
a  group  of  several  families,  as  is  so  often  the  case  in  Russian 
country   life.      The   same    cooperative   habit   can   be   noticed 


HOW   THE    PEASANTS   LIVE  169 

in  the  presence  outside  the  villages  of  flocks  and  herds  tended 
by  a  single  shepherd  or  cowherd,  generally  some  small  girl. 
The  average  family  has  only  a  very  few  head  of  cattle,  and 
usually  the  herding  is  done  in  common. 

The  village  consisted  as  a  rule  of  a  single  street,  a  mile  or 
more  long  Here  I  was  reminded  at  once  of  the  ever-present 
despotism  that  weighs  like  a  nightmare  on  the  land.  Most 
of  the  villages  have  the  appearance  of  fortified  camps,  are 
surrounded  by  palisades,  and  toward  evening  have  a  guard 
standing  at  the  gate.  This  is  no  mere  figure  of  speech,  for  the 
Government  actually  does  consider  the  villagers  to  be  prisoners 
for  the  night.  Here  is  an  order  issued  by  a  "land-official" 
in  1899  which  became  a  popular  model  for  such  orders  among 
other  such  officials  of  his  class: 

Nobody  shall  leave  the  village  at  night  at  all,  or  in  the  day-time  for 
more  than  twenty-four  hours  without  reporting  to  the  selectman  where 
he  is  going  and  for  what  purpose.  For  any  departure  without  permission 
the  guilty  one  shall  be  punished.  Anyone  who  departs  at  night  is  to  be 
reported  in  the  morning  by  the  watchmen  and  sentinels  to  the  selectman, 
who  is  to  inquire  into  the  matter  and  punish  disobedience,  even  if  it  be 
proven  that  there  was  nothing  suspicious  or  improper  in  the  departure. 

That  this  law  is  enforced  more  generally  than  ever  to-day 
there  need  be  little  doubt.  Further,  the  Government  has  not 
only  guarded  the  villages,  but  in  many  cases  has  established 
a  night  patrol  across  the  country  as  well  —  as  is  done  in  a 
conquered  country. 

There  is  a  remarkable  similarity  among  the  houses  in  a 
village.  As  a  rule  there  are  not  more  than  two  or  three  houses 
in  an  entire  village  that  differentiate  themselves  by  some  slight 
change  from  the  others  —  though  of  course  in  different  parts 
of  the  country  the  style  and  size  of  the  cottage  varies  consider- 
ably. There  is  usually  no  iron  employed,  and  even  wood 
for  doors  is  sparingly  used.  The  single  door  is  made  so  small 
that  a  peasant  above  the  average  height  is  unable  to  enter 
without  bowing  his  head.  Everywhere  the  people  spend  no 
small  part  of  their  time  in  re-thatching  the  roofs  and  re-plastering 
the  cracks  in  their  houses  with  mud.  Extremely  cheap  and 
amateur  construction  make  necessary  a  great  deal  more  repairs 
than  are  required  in  other  countries.     Of  course  if  the  house 


I70  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

falls  into  a  bad  condition  while  the  peasants  are  very  busy,  or 
when  they  have  lost  a  hand  by  death,  they  are  forced  to  stand 
the  cold  and  moisture  for  a  long  period. 

The  cottage  is  generally  fifteen  by  thirty  feet,  and  half  of  it, 
without  windows  and  constructed  more  poorly  than  the  rest, 
is  built  for  animals  rather  than  for  men.  Indeed,  every  cottage 
is  also  a  stable.  As  we  pass  through  the  low  door  we  come 
into  the  animals'  part  of  the  house.  Here  we  often  stumble 
over  cattle,  chickens,  and  pigs,  and  some  of  the  more  valuable 
agricultural  implements.  It  is  impossible  to  describe  this  part 
of  the  house,  for  there  is  really  nothing  here  to  describe. 
Passing  through  the  second  door  we  come  into  the  one  room, 
about  fifteen  feet  square,  that  serves  as  kitchen,  sleeping  and 
living  room  for  the  whole  family  of  six  to  twelve  persons  —  for 
a  "family,"  it  must  be  remembered,  consists  not  only  of  parents 
and  children,  but  also  of  the  grandparents,  and  perhaps  of  a 
non-relative  or  two,  for  all  single  unattached  adults  of  a  commu- 
nity are  divided  up  among  the  families. 

The  worked-out  old  people  —  they  are  the  cause  of  one  of 
the  greatest  tragedies  of  peasant  life.  They  are  the  paupers 
of  paupers.  It  is  no  easy  situation  for  a  family,  the  food- 
producers  of  which  are  starving,  to  be  compelled  to  share  its 
food  with  those  who  can  contribute  nothing.  Sometimes  the 
peasants  find  themselves  looking  forward  to  the  time  when  the 
old  people  will  be  removed  by  a  natural  cause.  Nor  is  this 
the  worst  of  the  tragedies  which  come  from  the  fearful  poverty 
and  overcrowding  in  the  cottages.  It  is  unnecessary  to  picture 
conditions  that  often  arise  when  ten  or  fifteen  people  of  both 
sexes  and  all  ages,  sometimes  not  very  nearly  related,  are  piled 
up  on  a  single  broad  wooden  shelf  and  the  single  earthen  stove 
that  constitute  the  only  cottage  beds. 

The  only  furniture  in  such  a  place  is  a  table,  benches  around 
the  wall,  and  the  large  shelf  that  composes  the  sleeping  place 
of  all  the  family,  except  the  old  people,  for  whom  the  top  of 
the  stove  is  reserved.  Both  benches  and  beds  remind  one  of 
the  jail  furniture  that  in  more  prosperous  countries  is  considered 
a  part  of  the  punishment  of  the  convicted  criminal. 

Almost  everywhere  windows  are  few  and  very  small;  they 
are  often  broken,  and  often  they  are  sealed    so    that   it    is 


HOW   THE   PEASANTS   LIVE  171 

impossible  to  open  them  the  year  through.  It  must  be  remem- 
bered that  in  mid-summer  Russia  has  the  same  hot  and  dry 
weather  that  prevails  in  America.  The  inability  to  open  the 
windows  in  the  summer  is  a  very  great  evil,  but  a  far  greater 
one  is  the  inability  to  replace  during  the  long  and  terrible  winter 
the  broken  panes  on  account  of  the  cost  of  glass.  In  consequence 
many  broken  windows  are  boarded  up  a  large  part  of  the  year. 
As  soon  as  the  weather  becomes  a  little  chilly  even  such  as 
can  be  opened  are  immediately  tightly  closed  until  the  return 
of  spring.  Many  superficial  visitors  are  disgusted  at  such 
an  unhealthy  habit;  but  this  is  not  a  matter  of  sanitary  or 
unsanitary  habits  —  it  is  a  matter  of  expense.  Nothing  is 
more  costly  in  many  parts  of  the  country  than  wood.  To  open 
one  of  the  little  windows,  even  partly  for  a  whole  day  or  night, 
would  doubtless  cost  the  peasant  several  kopecks  for  fuel. 
Perhaps  it  would  be  better  for  the  health  of  the  family  ^f  he 
would  spend  this  little  sum  and  eat  a  little  less,  already  famishing 
as  he  is.  Let  us  remember,  however,  that  a  large  part  even  of  the 
educated  classes  of  Russia's  neighbour,  Germany,  would  unques- 
tionably reach  the  same  unsanitary  solution  wherever  the 
question  lay  between  expense  and  fresh  air. 

Do  not  convict  the  peasant  too  hastily  of  uncleanliness. 
There  is  no  doubt  that  he  lives  in  contaminating  proximity  with 
his  calves,  chickens,  and  sometimes  also  with  his  pigs.  The 
reason  for  this  is  not  far  to  seek.  In  the  long  and  severe  winters 
the  animals  would  often  freeze  if  it  were  not  that  they  got  a 
little  of  the  heat  of  the  living-room.  Furthermore,  it  is  true 
the  peasant  does  not  often  change  his  clothes.  An  answer  to 
this  charge  is,  he  has  not  the  clothes  to  change.  In  addition 
it  can  be  said  in  his  behalf  that,  as  the  public  bath-house  is  an 
institution  of  his  country,  there  is  much  more  cleanliness  in 
Russia  than  there  was,  for  instance,  in  some  parts  of  America 
in  the  early  days  when  no  such  institution  existed. 

Not  only  do  the  peasants  not  have  enough  inner  garments 
to  permit  cleanliness,  but  they  do  not  have  enough  shoes  and 
overcoats  to  keep  them  warm.  I  was  shocked  when  I  saw 
women  passing  along  the  roads  in  their  short  skirts  on  windy 
winter  days  and  noticed  that  they  wore  no  woollen  clothing  of 
any  kind.     It  would  seem  to  be  possible  for  the  peasant  to  have 


172  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

at  least  enough  of  these  cotton  garments  for  cleanliness  and 
warmth  if  the  Government  had  not  put  such  a  high  customs 
tariff  on  cotton  and  cotton  goods  that  the  wretched  consumers 
are  forced  to  pay  several  prices  for  all  they  buy.  As  it  is,  the 
man  has  not  enough  shirts  or  the  woman  enough  skirts  even  for 
decency,  not  to  speak  of  warmth. 

/  As  for  woollen  garments,  they  are  rare.  Is  it  not  incredible 
that  in  this  country,  possessing  more  pasture  land  than  any 
other  on  earth,  there  should  be  insufficient  wool  for  the 
elementary  needs  of  the  population,  and  insufficient  hides  and 
leather  to  enable  the  people  to  wear  leather  shoes?  For  in  the 
south,  and  in  the  north  in  the  siunmer,  the  shoe  is  not  of  leather, 
but  is  of  woven  bark  such  as  is  used  by  many  a  primitive  race. 
Even  in  winter  one  sees  more  boots  of  felt  than  of  leather.  But 
worst  of  all,  these  wretched  people  are  not  able  to  afford  warm 
overcoats.  It  is  by  no  means  always  that  a  peasant  has  a 
good  sheep-skin  coat.  If  he  does  possess  one,  it  is  often  held 
together  in  tatters  for  many  years  \mtil  it  reaches  a  disgusting 
degree  of  filth.  Certainly  a  sheep- skin  coat  is  the  least 
expensive  garment  imaginable  to  protect  him  from  the  winter, 
but  even  that  is  all  but  beyond  his  attenuated  means. 

It  is  almost  superfluous  to  speak  of  the  dreadfully  low  quality 
and  poor  variety  of  the  peasant's  food.  He  himself  considers 
that  he  is  very  fortunate  when  he  has  enough  to  eat,  to  say 

'  nothing  of  quality  or  variety.  The  staple  diet  is  black  bread 
and  potato  soup,  with  in  siunmer  green  cucumbers  or  water- 
melons. The  staple  drink  is  not  tea  as  is  commonly  supposed; 
on  the  other  hand  this  is  considered  rather  as  a  luxtuy.  Their 
chief  drink  is  "kvas,"  which  is  brewed  from  sour  bread.  It  is 
not  only  tea  which  is  looked  upon  as  a  luxury  more  than  a 
necessity,  but  often  also  sugar,  cabbage,  and  even  a  sufficient 
amount  of  salt.  All  these  articles  are  to  be  seen  in  every 
peasant's  cottage,  but  they  are  very  sparingly  used.  The  tea 
is  diluted  and  adulterated  until  it  is  almost  imfit  to  drink,  the 
salt  is  coarse  and  dirty  from  long  keeping  imtil  it  is  repugnant 
even  to  the  eye.  Of  meat,  even  the  coarsest  cuts  of  pork  are 
not  eaten  daily,  but  are  a  luxury  indeed.  A  large  part  of  the 
peasant  families  have  meat  only  on  the  greatest  holidays  —  that 
is,  four  times  a  year. 


HOW   THE    PEASANTS   LIVE  173 

But  in  the  preceding  paragraph  I  have  spoken  only  of  the 
average.  A  teacher  from  one  of  the  poorer  districts,  who  knew 
all  the  peasants  of  her  village,  assured  me  that  there,  even 
when  there  is  no  famine,  the  ordinary  peasant  does  not  drink 
tea,  that  there  are  no  vegetables  in  common  use  except  green 
cucimibers,  and  that  he  who  can  put  fat  in  his  soup  is  considered 
by  the  others  to  be  a  rich  man.  Instead  of  meat  on  the  ordinary 
holidays,  they  were  able  to  purchase  only  a  little  dry  fish. 
And  during  the  frequent  famines  the  food  is  infinitely  more 
miserable;  the  flour,  to  increase  the  bulk  of  the  bread,  is  mixed 
with  hay,  straw,  bark,  and  even  earth. 

One  feels  keenly  just  what  life  on  this  basis  means  when  one 
considers  the  life  of  the  women.  Of  course,  it  is  impossible  for 
any  woman  that  must  work  like  a  man  in  the  fields  to  give  any 
attention  to  cooking.  Bread  is  baked  once  a  week,  and  this 
is  about  all  the  cooking;  occasionally,  with  a  great  effort  and 
at  a  sacrifice  of  her  already  exhausted  strength,  a  peasant  woman 
will  be  able  to  cook  a  little  potato  or  cabbage  soup  in  the  evening. 
Ordinarily  she  leaves  a  few  pieces  of  bread  at  home  for  the  chil- 
dren, takes  some  more  with  her  to  the  fields  and  returns  only  after 
an  absence  of  twelve  to  fifteen  hours  —  for  we  must  remember 
that  the  Russian  system  forces  the  peasants  to  work  at  a  great 
distance  from  the  villages.  It  happens  not  only  occasionally, 
but  very  commonly,  that  the  women  give  birth  to  children 
in  the  fields,  that  they  are  carried  home  only  in  the  evening, 
and  that  in  three  or  four  days  they  are  back  again  at  work,  tak- 
ing the  child  with  them.  The  inevitable  result  is  that  nearly 
every  peasant  woman  of  middle  age  is  sick  in  some  way  or  other. 

Women  who  work  and  live  and  suffer  like  this  are  naturally 
unable  to  see  anything  of  life  or  even  of  the  commonest  condi- 
tions immediately  around  them.  One  woman  with  whom  I 
spoke,  who  happened  to  be  very  intelligent,  had  never  been  on 
a  railway  train  in  all  the  forty-five  years  of  her  life  although 
the  station  was  only  four  or  five  miles  away.  Twelve  years 
before  my  visit  she  had  been  in  a  little  town  a  few  miles  away, 
but  not  since.  Her  case  was  not  an  extreme  one.  This  woman, 
as  well  as  other  educated  persons  in  the  neighbourhood,  assured 
me  that  in  a  village  not  very  far  away  the  women  were  unable 
to  feed  their  children  after  a  few  months,  and  that  the  children 


I 


174  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

were  then  noiirished  on  bread  previously  chewed  by  the  women 
and  put  into  little  sacks.  Of  course,  such  children  die  wholesale ; 
the  greater  part  of  Russia's  fearful  mortality  figures  apply  to 
children  under  one  year  of  age.  Also  in  the  village  referred  to 
even  the  grown-up  men  were  under-sized. 

I  spoke  of  these  fearful  conditions  to  one  of  Witte's  lieutenants 
in  St.  Petersburg,  and  asked  him  what  was  the  hope  for  the 
Russian  peasant.  Of  course  no  satisfactory  answer  was  forth- 
coming. But  although  he  did  not  have  a  solution,  he  did  have 
a  point  of  view,  and  this  came  out  as  the  result  of  his  telling 
how  it  was  very  common  among  the  peasants  to  wear  a  belt 
and  to  tighten  it  frequently  to  allay  the  pangs  of  hunger. 
"Why,  imder  the  present  perfectly  hopeless  circumstances," 
he  asked,  "is  this  not  a  very  practical  device?  Why  may  it  not 
pay  both  the  peasant  and  Russia  that  he  should  just  take  in  his 
belt?  The  peasant  is  underfed,  but  there  is  not  enough  work 
for  him  to  do.  Why  should  he  be  kept  in  full  strength  ?  Is  it 
not  fortunate  for  Russia  that  her  peasants  do  not  have  the  habit 
of  eating  as  much  as  they  do  elsewhere?  For  the  most  part 
they  manage  to  live  and  cost  the  coimtry  comparatively  little. 
This  is  lucky  for  the  peasant,  as  there  is  no  possibility  of 
obtaining  any  more.  Countries  differ  in  respect  to  diet  as  in 
respect  to  everything  else.  There  are  many  savage  races  that, 
forced  by  necessity,  have  accommodated  themselves  to  the  most 
varied  and  meagre  diet.  It  is  only  by  this  power  of  accommo- 
dation that  they  manage  to  stirvive." 

He  was  thoroughly  aware  of  all  the  tragdies  of  the  situation, 
but  he  accepted  them  as  if  there  was  no  ray  of  hope  in  any 
direction.  Like  the  minister  of  finance,  he  stated  that  Russia's 
grain  exports  were  momentarily  rising,  because  the  people  were 
too  poor  to  be  able  to  keep  their  food  for  themselves;  he  pointed 
out  that  the  exports  of  eggs  and  butter  from  Siberia  deprived 
the  Sibeiian  peasants  themselves  of  these  simple  articles  of  diet. 
But  when  he  finally  took  an  economic  standpoint  in  which  he 
viewed  the  peasant  entirely  as  he  viewed  a  horse,  the  true 
inwardness  of  his  philosophy  came  to  the  light.  While  we  were 
speaking  of  the  degeneration  of  the  Russian  horse  and  of  the 
fact  that  it  was  also  imderfed,  he  insisted  that  it  was  not  worth 
while  feeding  such  a  horsey  and  used  the  same  terms  with  which 


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HOW   THE    PEASANTS   LIVE  175 

he  had  spoken  of  the  peasant.  For  the  most  part  the  Russian 
officials  do  not  have  any  social  philosophy,  but  this  is  the 
morality  of  those  who  do.  The  Russian  peasants,  they  confess, 
are  in  a  deplorable  condition  —  so  little  advanced,  indeed, 
that  it  would  not  even  pay  for  the  State  to  make  any  sacrifice 
on  their  behalf. 

The  terribly  low  productivity  of  the  peasant's  agriculture 
and  the  small  size  of  his  income  are  of  course  at  the  bottom  of 
his  suffering.  He  is  receiving  about  one-third  the  income  of 
a  poor  German  peasant,  one-fourth  that  of  a  French.  He  is 
producing  only  about  one-half  enough  to  properly  feed  himself 
and  animals.  To  discuss  a  remedy  for  this  condition  leads 
at  once  to  the  whole  social  problem,  the  whole  economic  and 
political  situation  of  the  country,  a  matter  on  which  conclusions 
can  be  reached  only  farther  on;  but  in  the  meanwhlie  it  can  be 
pointed  out  how  the  situation  is  aggravated  by  the  Government. 
There  are  two  very  reliable  estimates  of  the  portion  of  the 
peasant's  income  which  goes  into  the  treasury  of  the  Government 
in  the  form  of  direct  taxation;  one  from  the  relatively  poor 
province  of  Saratov  and  the  other  from  the  relatively  rich 
province  of  Moscow.  In  the  poor  province,  where  the  net 
family  income  is  only  114  rubles  ($57),  more  than  half  goes  ^ 
in  the  form  of  taxes  to  the  Government.  In  Moscow  where 
the  income,  the  highest  in  Russia,  is  nearly  four  hundred 
rubles,  nearly  one-fifth  goes  to  taxation.  Of  the  taxes  the 
most  important  are  the  indirect. 

In  proportion  as  the  direct  taxes  have  been  slowly  lowered, 
the  indirect  have  been  rapidly  elevated.  It  must  not  be 
supposed,  however,  that  direct  land  taxes  absorb  any  small 
part  of  the  peasant's  income.  Direct  taxes  going  to  the  Central 
Government  have  been  recently  much  decreased,  but  there 
has  been  at  the  same  time  a  very  large  increase  in  direct  taxes 
going  to  the  province  and  the  village.  As  the  relation  between 
the  local  and  Central  Government  is  so  intimate  the  latter  takes 
advantage  of  the  new  taxing  power  of  the  local  government, 
made  possible  by  the  retirement  of  the  central  authorities,  to 
throw  off  on  the  provinces  many  of  its  own  burdens,  and  it  may 
soon  be  that  the  sum  total  of  all  direct  taxes  will  also  begin 
again  to  increase. 


< 


176  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

In  the  last  twenty-five  years  some  of  the  indirect  tax-rates 
have  been  raised  almost  every  year.  It  is  estimated  that 
between  1880  and  1902  the  tax  on  tea  increased  threefold,  that 
on  sugar,  five,  and  that  on  cotton  six;  the  increased  duties  on 
copper  and  iron  have  corresponded.  The  American  Bureau  of 
Statistics  estimates  that  on  account  of  the  taxing  system 
Russians  are  forced  to  pay  four  times  as  much  for  petroleum  as 
they  would  otherwise.  The  result  is  not  only  that  the  people 
are  paying  several  times  more  for  ordinary  articles  than  they 
should,  but  that  they  are  absolutely  unable  to  purchase  very 
large  quantities  of  any  of  the  articles  so  heavily  taxed.  Where 
modern  industries  are  arising,  as  in  the  cities,  and  the  people 
are  slightly  better  off,  they  are  consuming  five  times  as  much 
sugar,  ten  times  as  much  tea,  eighteen  times  as  much  petroleum, 
as  in  the  country. 

The  robbing  of  the  people  through  this  system  is  effected  not 
only  by  the  money  taken  by  the  State  itself,  but  also  through 
the  abnormal  profits  the  very  high  customs  tariff  gives  to  the 
Russian  manufacturer.  The  latter  is  the  chief  beneficiary  from 
the  several  prices  which  are  paid  for  cotton  goods  and  for  sugar. 
But  in  other  cases,  tea  and  alcohol  for  instance,  the  profit  of 
the  system  is  almost  altogether  the  Government's.  Four-fifths 
of  all  that  the  peasants  pay  for  alcohol  goes  into  the  coffers  of  the 
Government  and  half  of  what  he  pays  for  tea.  On  tea  and 
cotton  alone,  the  greater  portion  of  both  of  which  goes  into 
the  hands  of  the  masses,  the  Government  raises  over  a  hundred 
million  rubles. 

If  any  considerable  portion  of  all  these  sums,  so  vast  for  a 
poor  country  like  Russia,  came  back  to  the  people,  perhaps 
there  would  be  somewhat  less  reason  for  complaint.  But  if 
we  were  to  examine  the  expenditure  of  the  Russian  budget 
(excluding  expenditures  for  businesses  Iikc  alcohol  and  railways 
which  are  privately  operated  in  other  countries)  we  would  find 
that  over  one-half  of  the  total  sum  expended  for  purely  govern- 
mental ends,  goes  for  the  army  and  navy  and  the  police,  while 
another  fourth  goes  to  pay  the  interest  on  the  over-swollen 
national  debt.  In  reckoning  the  sum  paid  for  interest  by' the 
Government  as  one-fourth  of  the  total  expended,  I  have  not 
included  the  interest  on  sums  borrowed  for  railways,  although 


HOW   THE    PEASANTS   LIVE  177 

a  very  large  part  of  this  money  also  served  for  almost  purely 
military  ends. 

Considering  the  many  millions  of  persons  that  have  died 
in  Russia  in  the  last  decade  from  direct  starvation  or  diseases 
that  are  derived  from  it,  the  amount  borrowed  and  spent  on 
such  an  absolutely  prime  national  necessity  as  the  relief  of  famine 
has  been  trivial  —  a  total  of  a  few  hundred  million  rubles  in  all 
these  years.  We  cannot  at  all  grasp  the  conditions  of  the  life 
of  the  Russian  peasantry  without  recalling  the  almost  chronic 
famines.  We  must  remember  that  not  only  do  famines  occur 
occasionally,  but  that  in  the  larger  part  of  the  country  they 
occur  with  the  greatest  regularity  every  two  or  three  years. 
Of  course  I  did  not  fail  to  enter  into  a  famine  district  in  order 
to  see  with  my  own  eyes  what  the  conditions  were.  In  the 
district  of  Buzuluk,  in  the  province  of  Samara,  the  crop  had  been 
so  small  in  1906,  and  what  little  grain  there  was  left  was  so 
valuable,  that  the  peasants  pulled  the  stalks  by  hand,  finding 
it  impossible  to  use  their  scythes.  There  was  even  no  hay  for 
the  horses,  and  in  August  they  were  already  breaking  down 
with  disease  and  the  people  were  feeding  the  thatched  roofs  of 
bams  to  the  dying  animals.  In  a  small  district  seven  hundred 
cows  had  already  been  sold,  which  meant,  of  course,  more 
starvation  for  the  coming  year.  Horses  were  selling  at  five  and 
ten  rubles,  and  goats  for  as  little  as  seventy-five  kopecks.  The 
peasants  had  recently  been  forced  to  buy  grain  at  a  ruble  and 
a  quarter,  the  grain  they  had  sold  a  few  weeks  before  for  three- 
quarters  of  a  ruble.  The  children  were  already  too  weak  to 
study  and  had  left  the  schools  —  the  village  meetings  had 
declared  that  they  would  soon  die  of  hunger.  Some  parents, 
finding  they  could  not  feed  their  children  by  staying  at  home, 
had  left  them  behind  in  the  village,  hoping  they  might  be  able 
somewhere  or  other  to  earn  them  a  little  bread. 

The  Government  was  doing  something  to  relieve  the  famine, 
but  the  relief  was  ridiculously  insufficient  and  outrageously 
administered.  The  peasants  were  being  given  for  the  whole 
season  forty  pounds  of  grain  for  each  person  in  the  village, 
whereas  at  least  two  hundred  pounds  would  be  required.  The 
Government  was  feeding  the  people  not  with  bread,  but  with  a 
weak  soup  made  out  of  potatoes  and  bread.     Not  only  was  the 


i 


178  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Government  ration  insufficient,  but  in  many  places  the  grain 
sent  for  seeds  was  mixed  with  earth  and  manure,  even  to  such  an 
extent  that  in  one  case  the  peasants  of  a  certain  village  had 
refused  absolutely  to  accept  it.  In  some  districts  the  grain 
sent  for  food  was  rotten  and  full  of  worms;  in  others  the  seed 
needed  for  planting  on  the  first  of  September  had  only  been 
half  delivered  when  that  time  arrived.  In  still  others,  as  was 
brought  out  in  the  noted  case  of  the  stealing  grain-contractor, 
Lidval,  and  his  friend,  Assistant  Minister  Gurko,  a  large  portion 
of  the  sum  assigned  for  this  purpose  was  stolen  outright.  I 
have  called  attention  elsewhere  to  the  fact  that  Lidval  was  let 
out  of  jail  on  bail,  and  that  it  was  impossible  in  the  Government's 
courts  to  place  any  criminal  responsibility  on  the  shoulders  of 
the  former  minister. 

Let  us  recall  that  while  the  peasants  are  starving,  the  exports 
of  rye,  even  from  the  very  district  where  the  famine  occurred, 
continued,  and  that  the  total  exports  of  the  country  in  the  famine 
year  of  1906  even  rose,  and  that  the  encouragement  of  these 
large  exports  is  the  basis  of  the  whole  financial  policy  of  the 
country.  And  let  us  remember,  finally,  that  the  new  law  which 
allows  the  peasant  for  the  first  time  to  sell  or  mortgage  his  land, 
will  rob  him  during  such  famine  periods  of  the  only  assurance 
that  remains  to  him  of  the  slightest  chance  of  extricating  himself 
from  his  hopeless  situation. 

In  1906,  when  the  official  reports  showed  that  thirty  million 
people  were  on  the  verge  of  starvation,  Russia's  grain  exports 
actually  reached  a  value  of  more  than  five  hundred  million  rubles — 
more  than  sufficient  to  have  prevented  the  death  by  famine 
diseases  of  several  hundred  thousand  children,  and  to  have  kept 
alive  millions  of  dying  horses  and  cattle  on  which  the  peasants'  life 
or  death  in  the  future  depended.  If  the  peasants  had  not  been 
pauperised  by  taxes,  they  would  have  bought  this  grain  and  never 
have  allowed  it  to  leave  the  country .  If  the  landlords  had  not  been 
subsidised  for  a  generation,  they  would  never  have  owned  either 
the  grain  or  the  land  that  produced  it,  and  the  famine  would  not 
even  have  existed.  For  famine  is  a  by-product  of  poverty.  We 
have  the  same  droughts  in  America  as  they  do  in  Russia,  some- 
times even  the  same  crop  failures;  but  we  do  not  have 
famines.     Our  farmers  have  too  much  money  in  the  bank. 


o    a, 
o 

o  "5 

M       to 

W    o 

O 


HOW   THE    PEASANTS   LIVE  179 

And  this  new  law  is  Stolypine's  great  reform.  The  over- 
whehning  majority  of  the  people  must  continue  to  starve. 
The  State  is  not  prepared  to  make  any  great  financial  sacrifice  or 
fundamental  reorganisation  of  the  Government  in  their  behalf. 
But  at  any  cost  it  must  have  a  few  million  farmers  of  the  Ger- 
man or  American  sort.  So  the  State  has  decided  to  give  over 
the  mass  into  the  hands  of  the  more  thrifty  and  business-like 
few,  to  sacrifice  the  ninety  penniless  families  of  the  village 
for  the  five  or  ten  that  have  a  little  cash.  The  penniless  peasants 
are  to  be  allowed  for  the  first  time  to  sell  and  mortgage  their 
little  lots.  The  very  first  famine  they  will  be  sold  into  the 
hands  of  their  more  usurious  or  thrifty  neighbours.  It  will  then 
doubtless  be  possible  for  many  of  these  latter  to  build  up  quite 
modem  little  farms  of  fifty  to  a  hundred  acres  with  several  of 
the  former  peasants  as  labourers,  forced  to  accept  all  wages 
and  conditions  offered  or  to  starve. 

The  Government  proposes  to  reduce  ninety  million  of  Russia's 
peasants  to  a  still  lower  level  of  dependence  and  misery  than 
that  on  which  they  now  live,  in  order,  by  handing  over  their 
property  to  the  rest,  to  build  up  the  prosperity  of  the  remaining 
ten  millions.  This,  in  Governmental  Russia,  is  what  is  called 
"social  reform." 


CHAPTER   IV 

HOW    THE    PEASANTS    TILL    THE    SOIL 

IT  IS  impossible  for  the  peasants  to  extricate  themselves 
from  their  terrible  predicament.  Their  farming  is  doomed 
to  pitiful  failure  from  the  outset.  The  youngest  American  far- 
mer boy  would  die  of  irritation  if  he  were  set  to  work  tmder 
the  antiquated  conditions  that  prevail  everywhere  in  Russia. 
It  is  very  difficult  indeed  to  make  the  reader  realise  how  far 
behind  in  this  respect  the  Russian  peasants  are;  yet  we  must 
not  imagine  them  too  backward.  It  was  only  a  generation 
or  two  ago  when  many  parts  of  America  and  several  European 
countries  were  farmed  in  a  similar  manner;  and  in  the  United 
States  even  to-day  there  are  to  be  found  localities  in  the  out- 
of-the-way  mountains  of  the  East  where  methods  are  not 
much  more  improved. 

In  the  conditions  of  labour  we  can  see,  as  in  no  other  part  of 
the  lives  of  the  Russian  people,  the  extent  to  which  they  have 
been  debarred  from  civilisation,  and  why  their  condition  is 
hopeless  without  some  revolutionary  change.  We  have  seen 
that  the  peasant  is  underfed;  Kornilov  shows  that  the  men 
have  17  per  cent.,  the  horses  40  per  cent.,  less  food  than  they 
require,  even  to  maintain  their  full  working  power.  But  the 
.peasants  want  work  as  much  as  they  do  bread;  they  are  even 
more  underworked  than  they  are  underfed.  A  Government 
commission  investigating  the  cause  of  poverty  in  central  Russia 
found  the  men  had  enough  work  to  employ  only  one-fifth,  and 
the  horses  enough  to  employ  only  one- third,  of  their  working 
power. 

Here,  then,  were  the  great,  incontestable  truths  underlying 
the  peasants'  condition.  Neither  the  farmers  nor  the  iarm 
animals  have  enough  to  keep  them  from  physical  degeneration. 
Even  if  the  peasant  was  sufficiently  occupied  to  keep  himself 
from  starving  to  death,  there  would  still  be  no  chance  for  him  to 

180 


HOW   THE    PEASANTS   TILL   SOIL  i8i 

save  money  and  to  accumulate  that  capital  absolutely  necessary 
for  the  regeneration  of  his  agriculture;  even  if  the  men  and 
farm  animals  had  enough  to  eat,  the  peasants  would  still  be 
idle  three-fourth  of  their  time  and  the  horses  one-half  the  time ; 
there  would  be  no  money  to  buy  better  animals  or  better  ploughs, 
no  means  to  increase  the  miserable  yield  of  the  crops  and  to 
improve  the  lot  of  the  miserable  agriculturist. 

We  cannot  account  for  these  conditions  by  saying  simply 
that  Russia  has  not  entered  into  the  pale  of  civilisation  as 
far  as  agriculture  is  concerned.  Everywhere  one  passes  great 
estates  of  the  nobility  and  merchants,  or  occasionally  of  the 
very  exceptional  peasants  who  have  become  rich  from  usury 
and  the  very  sufferings  of  their  fellow-countrymen.  In  nearly 
every  such  estate  modern  agricultural  methods  are  applied, 
often  in  the  most  advanced  manner.  Everywhere  peasants  are 
employed  on  these  places,  and  after  a  little  natural  prejudice 
at  the  beginning,  they  soon  master  the  most  complicated 
machines.  It  is  not,  therefore,  as  if  the  people  did  not  know 
what  scientific  methods  are.  We  are  facing  in  Russia  not 
the  poverty  of  barbarism,  but  the  poverty  of  civilisation,  a  clear 
social  product. 

Anyone  with  a  pencil  and  paper  can  verify  in  a  few  minutes 
the  reckoning  of  the  great  geographist,  Elisee  Reclus,  that 
Russia,  cultivated  like  Great  Britain,  should  sustain  the  popu- 
lation of  five  hundred  million  souls.  Cultivated  like  the  United 
States  even,  it  should  keep  in  prosperity  half  that  number; 
whereas  at  the  present  moment  a  large  part  of  its  one  hundred 
and  forty  million  starves.  Nor  does  the  condition  tend  to 
improve.  Every  year,  while  the  population  increases  2  or  3 
per  cent. ,  the  agricultural  production  of  the  country  increases  only 
about  half  as  fast.  While  American  farmers  have  learned  to 
get  at  least  twice  as  much  from  an  acre  as  they  did  half  a 
century  ago,  the  Russian  peasants  are  actually  producing  less 
than  they  did  at  the  time  of  the  emancipation  in  1861. 

This  is  bankruptcy,  ruin,  and  degeneration  for  the  peasants' 
agriculture.  Of  course  the  soil  is  being  robbed  and  exhausted 
and  the  farm  animals  are  becoming  weaker  and  smaller  every 
year.  In  the  agricultural  section,  too,  men  die  twice  as  rapidly 
as  in  any  other  modem  country.     Every  year  half  a  million 


i82  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

human  lives,  more  than  those  lost  in  the  whole  of  the  Japanese 
war,  are  sacrificed  to  the  demon  poverty. 

This  is  the  social  evil  in  Russia,  this  is  the  marsh  and  quick- 
sand on  which  courtier-statesmen  are  building  their  gilded 
and  tawdry  structure  of  mere  police  reform.  Since  Witte's 
Council  of  State  declared  the  Government  helpless  to  aid  the 
peasantry,  no  minister  has  had  the  effrontery  even  to  claim 
that  anything  could  be  done  to  strike  at  the  root  of  Russia's  ills. 

When  I  went  to  the  villages  I  knew  that  I  saw  conditions 
that  have  existed  over  half  a  century,-  thg,t  are  not  improving 
themselves  to-day,  and  that  the  Government  has  no  hope  to 
improve  materially  **in  this  epoch,"  to  use  the  words  of  Witte. 
When  I  saw  how  the  Russian  Government  leaves  the  farmer 
to  sow  and  reap,  I  saw  at  the  same  time  into  the  very  heart 
of  hearts  of  the  Czarism's  pretensions.  Laying  aside  for  the 
moment  the  question  of  the  right  of  any  man  to  govern  and 
master  another  without  that  other's  consent,  forgetting  that 
the  Russian  peasant  has  a  right  to  the  full  power  over  his  own 
life,  if  for  no  other  reason  than  because  nobody  else  has  any 
superior  claim  to  exercise  that  power,  let  us  see  how  the  Czar  has 
employed  his  "God-given"  pretension  to  act  as  "shepherd 
to  his  flock,'*  to  employ  again  a  favourite  official  phrase. 

Before  entering  into  the  Russian  villages  themselves,  even 
from  the  train  windows,  two  or  three  significant  features  of  the 
peasants*  agriculture  can  be  noted:  first,  that  the  fields  are  every- 
where divided  into  very  long  and  ridiculously  narrow  strips,  often 
stretching  as  far  as  the  eye  can  reach  and  only  a  few  paces  wide ; 
and,  second,  that  every  third  field  is  lying  fallow  all  the  year 
around.  The  strips  result  from  the  fact  that  all  the  land  of  the 
village  is  the  common  property  of  the  whole.  In  their  crude 
efforts  to  attain  equality  in  the  division  of  the  land,  and  the 
absence  of  any  method  of  exactly  estimating  the  value  of  the 
different  kinds  of  soil  in  the  village's  possession,  each  field  is 
divided  among  all  the  several  hundred  villagers  in  this  manner. 
Even  where,  as  it  happens  sometimes  in  Western  Russia,  that 
a  single  peasant  is  allowed  to  own  several  **  shares,"  the  same 
method  of  division  is  used. 

This  custom,  one  of  the  greatest  evils  in  the  present  system, 
and  recognised  as   such  both   by   the   Government    and    the 


HOW   THE   PEASANTS   TILL   SOIL  183 

peasants,  is  to  be  attributed  almost  entirely  to  the  oppressive 
system  of  the  Government.  No  sooner  was  there  a  measure  of 
liberty  a  year  or  so  ago,  than  both  peasants  and  educated  persons 
who  worked  in  their  behalf  began  to  replace  this  awkward 
triennial  redistribution  of  the  land  by  some  kind  of  graduated 
land  tax,  such  as  is  already  in  practice  in  Australia.  There  is 
no  tendency  on  the  part  of  the  peasants  to  abandon  their  almost 
instinctive  insistence  on  the  greatest  possible  economic  equality, 
but  it  is  evident  that  a  graduated  tax  is  a  far  superior  method 
of  reaching  this  end  than  the  perpetual  redistribution  of  the 
land,  especially  in  these  utterly  impractical  narrow  strips. 

The  other  feature  to  be  seen  from  the  car  window,  the  fallow 
fields,  indicate  the  still  universal  use  in  Russia  of  the  ancient 
"three  field  system."  The  peasantry  have  never  been  rich 
enough  to  afford  a  rotation  of  crops,  to  be  able  to  plant  a  field 
in  root  crops  and  to  wait  for  a  good  yield;  neither  have  they 
enough  farm  animals  to  be  able  properly  to  utilise  these  crops, 
or  to  manure  the  fields.  If  they  stick  to  the  old  wasteful  system 
it  is  not  due  to  ignorance,  but  to  the  pressure  of  sheer  economic 
necessity. 

The  implements  used  by  the  peasants  are  almost  incredibly 
crude.  The  majority  of  the  waggons  I  have  examined  were 
made  without  the  least  scrap  of  iron,  as  was  sometimes  the  case 
among  our  pioneer  farmers  over  a  century  ago.  The  plough 
is  for  the  most  part  of  a  type  that  has  been  in  use  for  more  than 
a  hundred  years,  while  the  so-called  new  plough,  also  in  com- 
mon use,  is  two  or  three  generations  behind  the  times.  The 
harrow,  like  the  waggon,  is  made  without  a  scrap  of  iron.  Nor 
is  it  iron  alone  that  is  too  expensive  for  extensive  use;  it  is  very 
rare  that  the  peasant  can  afford  anything  but  rope  or  thongs 
of  some  wild  fibre  for  the  harness  either  of  his  carts  or  his 
ploughing  implements. 

In  this  beautiful  and  immensely  rich  agricultural  country, 
with  its  long  simny  days  in  the  summer,  its  plentiful  snows  in 
the  winter,  and  its  very  wonderful  black  soil,  the  vastest  agricul- 
tural plain  in  the  world,  all  the  work  of  cultivating  the  soil  is  car- 
ried on  in  such  a  primitive  and  wasteful  manner  that  far  more 
of  its  riches  go  to  waste  than  are  economically  utilised.  Every- 
thing, of  course,  is  done  by  hand.  The  seeds  are  cast  out  of  a 


1 84  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

sack  or  apron,  as  they  were  a  hundred  years  ago.  Naturally, 
the  birds  that  are  to  be  seen  everywhere  in  inamense  swarms, 
get  a  large  part.  Then  if  there  is  too  much  rain,  the  seeds  rot, 
or  if  not  enough,  it  is  very  common  for  the  wind  to  heap  them 
up  or  to  blow  them  away.  The  ploughing  as  a  rule  is  about  six 
or  eight  inches  into  the  soil.  In  the  eastern  half  of  Russia,  in 
the  most  fertile  sections,  droughts  are  very  frequent.  If  a  plough 
was  here  used  that  turned  up  from  twelve  to  eighteen  inches, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  use  of  the  modem  dust  blanket  idea,  there 
would  be  very  few  famines  at  all  in  the  land,  but  at  the  worst 
only  half  crops.  That  this  is  no  exaggeration  is  proven  by  the 
results  already  achieved  by  some  of  the  German  colonists  that 
settled  in  the  heart  of  Russia  over  a  century  ago. 

In  the  summer  of  1905,  when  there  was  almost  a  complete 
crop  failure  on  the  lower  Volga,  where  I  happened  to  be,  I 
was  able  to  secure  some  of  the  crop  statistics  of  these  German 
colonists  and  their  Russian  neighbours  in  nine  German  and 
eighteen  Russian  townships.  These  figures  show  that  already 
the  Germans  have  learned  to  produce  one-quarter  or  one-half 
crop  where  the  Russians  get  practically  nothing.  In  the 
majority  of  the  Russian  townships,  the  rye  crops  showed  next 
to  nothing,  while  in  the  majority  of  the  German  there  was 
almost  one-quarter  of  a  normal  crop.  While  a  large  part  of 
the  Russian  townships  produced  less  than  one-quarter  of  the 
normal  wheat  crops,  the  majority  of  the  German  townships 
were  able  to  obtain  from  one-quarter  to  one-half  of  a  normal 
crop.  Now  of  course  these  Germans  are  also  poor  and  have 
by  no  means  introduced  the  most  modern  methods.  Where 
they  obtained  a  fourth,  there  is  little  doubt  that  our  Kansas 
farmer  could  have  obtained  half  a  crop. 

Of  course  the  first  cause  of  the  peasants'  agriculture  is  his 
poverty,  just  as  the  first  cause  of  his  poverty  is  his  bad  agri- 
culture. The  average  peasant  family  is  enabled  to  obtain  an 
income  altogether  of  only  one  htmdred  to  two  hundred  rubles 
(fifty  to  one  hundred  dollars) ;  the  most  friendly  of  the  reformers 
do  not  undertake  to  promise  him  that  he  will  be  able  to  bring 
his  income  to  higher  than  two  hundred  rubles  within  the 
first  few  years.  To  show  just  what  these  figures  mean,  we 
have  many  scientific  investigations  of  the  peasants*  expendi- 


HOW   THE   PEASANTS   TILL   SOIL  185 

ture.  Such  an  inquiry  in  the  province  of  Veronege  showed 
that  the  peasants'  total  household  expenditure,  outside  of 
purchases  of  food  for  men  and  horses,  was  a  little  less  than 
one  hundred  rubles,  that  he  invested  for  building  thirty- 
four,  for  clothes  twenty-five,  for  farm  animals  twenty -four, 
for  implements  about  eight,  and  for  furniture  and  vessels 
six.  If  we  convert  these  figures  into  dollars  it  is  not  necessary 
to  have  any  further  explanation  of  the  backwardness  of  the 
peasants'  agriculture. 

I  took  pains  frequently  to  learn  what  the  peasant  paid  for 
ploughs,  harrows,  and  waggons  —  and  these  prices  will  indicate 
the  inefficiency  of  the  implements.  For  the  most  modem  plough 
in  use  he  was  paying  five  rubles  and  every  three  years  he  had 
to  renew  the  ploughshare  at  the  cost  of  about  1.80  rubles.  These 
ploughs  were  manufactured  in  the  village  with  the  exception 
of  certain  bolts,  screws,  and  simple  pieces  that  the  smiths 
bought  from  the  factory.  I  found  that  the  peasants  rarely  paid 
more  than  ten  rubles  for  a  waggon,  and  one  waggon-maker  assured 
me  a  majority  of  those  he  made  he  sold  for  only  five  rubles 
and  that  such  a  waggon  was  the  result  of  one  week  of  his  labour. 
The  harrows  with  iron  teeth,  which  are  in  rather  common  use, 
are  worth  five  or  six  rubles,  but  I  saw  more  wooden  ones  which 
were  only  worth  a  ruble  or  two. 

I  have  traced  the  blame  of  these  conditions  first  of  all  to  the 
poverty  and  general  condition  of  the  country;  but  the  Govern- 
ment, besides  being  responsible  for  this,  has  also  a  special  blame. 
The  tariff  of  the  customs  duties  on  iron  has  been  placed  so  high 
that  the  peasants  can  scarcely  afford  to  use  even  nails.  As 
a  result  Russia  uses  per  head  one-tenth  as  much  iron  as  the 
United  States.  The  duty  on  the  machinery  the  peasant  requires 
is  correspondingly  high,  and  there  can  be  no  question  that  a 
large  part  of  all  his  technical  expenses  are  due  directly  to  this 
high  tariff  policy  of  the  Government. 

The  condition  in  respect  to  the  live  stock  is  even  more 
illuminating  than  that  of  the  implements.  More  than  one- 
fourth  of  the  peasants*  households  are  entirely  without  a  horse, 
another  third  has  only  one  horse,  while  only  slightly  more  than 
a  third  have  two  or  more.  The  condition  is  not  getting  better, 
but  worse.     In  the  centre  of  the  country,  out  of  one  hundred 


1 86  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

families,  one  every  year  joins  the  horseless  class.  Still  more 
striking  is  the  fact  that  the  average  Russian  horse  weighs 
little  more  than  half  of  the  better  breeds  of  France.  In  1870 
there  were  nine  head  of  cattle  for  each  household.  Every 
ten  years  this  number  has  fallen  one ;  in  1 900  the  average  number 
was  only  a  little  over  six  head  of  cattle  for  each  household. 
Neither  in  cattle,  sheep  nor  pigs  are  the  Russian  peasants  one- 
quarter  as  well  provided  as  those  of  Germany. 

To  make  still  more  clear  the  remarkable  inferiority  of  the 
agriculture  of  the  Russian  peasant,  let  us  contrast  the  better 
farmers  among  the  Russian  peasants  with  those  of  the  leading 
agricultural  states  of  the  American  Northwest.  The  American 
farmer  in  this  section  has  about  one  hundred  acres  of 
land,  the  Russian  peasant  about  twenty.  The  value  of  the 
land  of  the  American  farmer  is  about  four  times  as  great,  so 
we  see  already  that  the  landed  wealth  of  the  American  is  twenty 
times  that  of  his  Russian  competitor  —  for  we  must  not  forget 
that  these  two  great  grain-exporting  countries  and  their  farmers 
are  competitors  in  the  world  market. 

The  value  of  the  live  stock  and  implements  is  in  about  the 
same  proportion.  We  may  reckon  this  in  Russia  to  be  about 
twenty-five  rubles  for  machinery  and  seventy-five  for  live 
stock — that  is  altogether  about  one  hundred  rubles  or  fifty 
dollars ;  whereas  the  American  farmer  of  the  Northwest  has  more 
than  two  hundred  dollars  in  implements  and  machinery  and 
nearly  eight  hundred  dollars  in  live  stock.  Witte  estimated 
the  value  of  the  Russian  agriculture  products  of  1897  as  one 
and  a  half  billion  rubles;  those  of  America  were  about  eight 
times  as  great.  The  area  of  the  crops  in  the  two  countries  was 
about  the  same.  This  relative  condition  is  not  changing,  for 
whereas  in  the  last  decade  our  wheat  crop  increased  39  per 
cent,  that  of  Russia  scarcely  increased  9  per  cent. 

The  contrast  is  even  greater  in  regard  to  exports.  In  the 
fifteen  years  preceding  1902  the  wheat  exports  of  America 
nearly  doubled,  while  those  of  Russia  remained  almost  stationary. 
But  I  have  suggested  in  a  former  chapter  that  the  whole  economy 
of  the  Russian  nation,  the  maintenance  of  the  gold  standard, 
the  payment  of  the  interest  on  foreign  loans,  all  depend  upon 
a  large  grain  export.     The  majority  of  the  total  exports  of 


HOW   THE   PEASANTS   TILL   SOIL  187 

Russia  is  indeed  grain;  butter  and  eggs  bring  up  the 
proportion  of  agricultural  products  in  exports  to  two-thirds  of 
the  total,  and  the  rest  consists  of  the  raw  materials,  like 
wood  and  petroleum;  manufactured  products  do  not  make 
3  per  cent,  of  the  whole.  If  the  agricultural  exports,  espec- 
ially wheat,  do  not  rise  rapidly,  then  the  whole  financial 
policy  deliberately  chosen  by  the  Government  has  proved 
itself  a  failure. 

It  would  doubtless  have  been  more  wise  on  the  part  of  the 
Government  to  have  discontinued  entirely  the  policy  of  encour- 
aging grain  exports  from  a  country  where  both  men  and  farm 
animals  are  starving  for  the  need  of  grain.  Only  lately  another 
repetition  of  famine  has  forced  the  minister  of  finance  not 
only  to  reverse  the  former  policy,  but  actually  to  discourage 
the  exports.  Both  from  the  extreme  reactionary  and  the 
extreme  revolutionary  party  there  was  a  strong  cry  for  the 
forbidding  of  exports  from  starving  districts,  but  it  was  only 
after  her  neighbour, Turkey,  had  taken  this  very  essential  means 
of  protecting  its  population  from  wholesale  starvation  that 
Russia  was  forced  to  follow  its  example.  Of  course  it  is 
recognised  by  all  writers  on  economic  questions  that  the  forbid- 
ding of  exports  must  be  only  a  temporary  expedient,  absolutely 
necessary  as  it  may  be  in  times  of  famine  and  war. 

But  the  real  source  of  the  degeneration  of  Russian  agriculture 
lies  deeper  than  the  exporting  of  the  food  of  starving  men 
and  beasts.  At  the  time  of  the  emancipation  in  i86i  it  was 
already  recognised  that  a  peasant  family,  in  order  to  support 
itself,  should  possess  at  least  twelve  and  a  half  dessiatines 
(or  thirty-three  acres)  of  land.  When  serf-owners  allowed 
their  peasants'  land  to  fall  below  this  amount,  the  Government 
insisted  that  the  peasants  should  be  transported  to  some  of  the 
newer  sections,  such  as  the  Province  of  Samara.  But  in  1875 
the  average  amoimt  of  land  in  the  peasants'  possession  was 
already  only  about  nine  dessiatines  (twenty-four  acres)  for  each 
household;  in  1900  it  had  fallen  further  to  six  and  a  half  dessi- 
atines (seventeen  acres)  —  just  about  half  enough,  according 
to  the  Government's  own  calculation,  to  keep  a  peasant  family 
alive.  This  does  not  quite  represent  the  situation,  for  in  some 
places  the  decrease  has  been  relatively  slight,  whereas  in  the 


i88  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

south  and  west  the  peasants  have  at  the  present  time  less  than 
a  half  of  what  they  had  at  the  time  of  the  emancipation. 

Only  in  the  extreme  south  does  the  value  of  the  average 
peasant  farm  rise  as  high  as  five  hundred  rubles,  whereas  in  the 
leading  agricultural  districts  in  the  centre  and  east  it  is  between 
three  himdred  and  seventy- five  and  five  hundred  rubles,  and  in 
the  north  and  west  under  this  sum.  An  American  can  get 
an  idea  of  these  farms  only  by  comparing  them  with  the 
miserable  little  holdings  of  our  Southern  Negroes.  Even  this 
does  not  represent  the  low  level  of  the  Russian  agriculturist; 
the  woods  and  meadows  so  necessary  for  the  pasturing  of  cattle 
and  the  forests  that  supply  building  material  and  fuel  are 
largely  in  the  hands  of  the  landlords.  In  the  north  where 
the  land  is  poor,  and  in  the  east  where  the  so-called  "beggar's 
lots"  exist,  a  large  part  of  the  revolts  that  have  occurred  in  the 
last  two  years  have  had  for  their  immediate  cause  some  quarrel 
with  the  landlords  over  the  woods  and  meadows.  So  far  have 
the  proprietors  gone  in  protecting  such  monopolised  property 
rights  that  they  have  even  forbidden  the  gathering  of  berries 
or  mushrooms. 

The  "beggar's  lots"  are  those  of  the  peasants  whose  masters 
at  the  time  of  the  emancipation  took  advantage  of  the  clause 
of  the  law  allowing  them  to  give  the  peasants  a  diminutive  piece 
of  land  outright,  rather  than  to  sell  them  a  larger  piece.  At 
this  time  these  "beggar's  lots"  consisted  usually  of  less  than 
one  dessiatine  (two  and  three-quarter  acres).  Now,  owing 
to  the  increase  of  population  and  division  of  these  properties, 
the  peasant  owners  are  often  possessed  of  no  more  than  one 
single  acre.  Such  owners  of  "beggar's  lots  "  are  of  course  forced 
to  rent  land  from  the  landlord  at  his  own  terms  if  they  remain 
in  the  country.  The  proprietors  assign  for  this  purpose  the 
worst  and  least  accessible  of  their  lands,  at  rents  which  have 
very  often  been  proved  statistically  to  amount  to  more  than 
the  net  product,  and  sometimes  even  to  twice  as  much.  Of 
course  such  rents  are  not,  and  cannot  be,  collected.  They  mean 
simply  that  the  peasants  are  forced  to  do  the  landlords'  work  on 
the  "rented"  land  for  the  price  often  of  nothing  more  than  the 
straw  that  is  left  over.  As  part  of  the  rent  of  meadows  the 
landlords  often  insist  on  the  transportation  of  their  grain  to  the 


HOW  THE    PEASANTS   TILL   SOIL  189 

railways,  usually  at  a  considerable  distance,  and  even  on  as 
much  as  two-thirds  of  the  hay  crop  besides.  Little  wonder 
the  helpless  peasants  revolt. 

Meanwhile  all  these  conditions  are  always  getting  worse. 
The  peasant's  poverty  and  the  exhaustion  of  the  soil  enable 
him  to  get  less  from  the  land  than  he  did  a  generation  ago, 
whereas  land  values  and  rents  have  risen  more  than  threefold. 
Far  from  being  of  any  service  whatever  to  the  people  in  this 
hopeless  situation,  the  Government  is  an  even  more  oppressive 
financial  burden  than  the  landlords  themselves.  Professor 
Janson  has  shown  that  for  many  years  continually  (in  fact,  until 
two  years  ago)  the  Government  taxes  were  often  equal  to  the 
peasant's  income  from  the  land,  and  sometimes  even  twice  as 
much.  Again,  it  goes  without  saying,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
high  rents  just  mentioned,  that  such  taxes  were  not  collected. 
But  these  excessive  burdens  meant  that  the  tax-collecting 
officials  were  present  at  the  time  of  the  harvest  and  took  every 
scrap  of  the  peasant's  property  that  was  not  necessary  to  prevent 
his  immediate  starvation.  As  we  shall  see  later,  the  Government 
actually  intended  that  this  tax  should  make  the  former  serf 
of  a  private  individual  the  serf  of  the  State.  The  taxes  were  so 
high  that  they  took  from  the  peasants  not  only  all  that  the  land 
could  produce,  but  also  a  very  large  part  of  all  that  he  could 
make  by  his  labour  elsewhere. 

Professor  Simkhovitch  quotes  figures  from  the  province  of 
Novgorod  showing  that  the  food  deficit  to  be  made  up  by  labour 
of  the  peasants  in  the  cities  or  on  the  estates  of  the  landlords 
amounted  to  three  million  rubles,  taxes  to  a  similar  sum,  and 
that  all  that  remained  to  the  peasants  of  this  province,  after 
all  their  labour  for  themselves  and  for  other  persons,  was  only 
about  twelve  and  a  half  rubles  per  household,  from  which 
infinitesimal  amount  they  had  to  purchase  their  clothing,  part 
of  their  food,  and  their  agricultural  irriplements.  The  same 
writer  quotes  the  opinion  of  Professor  Janson  to  the  effect  that 
the  peasantry  was  economically  better  off  even  during  serfdom 
than  at  the  present  time. 

The  result  of  this  extreme  poverty  is  of  course  to  drive  a 
very  large  part  of  the  peasantry  into  the  position  of  mere 
agricultural  labourers.     Of  these  there  are  now  in  Russia  many 


19©  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

millions.  What  it  means  to  be  a  farm  worker  in  Russia  one 
can  very  readily  grasp  from  the  wages  they  receive.  One 
of  the  most  scientific  and  complete  studies  on  the  subject  has 
been  produced  by  the  local  government  board  of  Poltava. 
The  wages  of  this  class  of  labour  from  1890  to  1900  varied  from 
twenty-two  to  forty  kopecks  a  day,  with  the  exception  of  a 
single  year.  The  average  was  thirty-three  kopecks  (seventeen 
cents).  The  monthly  wages  were  on  the  average  $3.06,  and  the 
yearly  wages  $29.46.  The  wages  in  the  United  States,  except 
in  the  South,  were  in  1900  about  seventeen  dollars  per  month,  or 
nearly  six  times  as  much. 

This  by  no  means  indicates  the  worst  of  the  Russian  wage 
conditions  in  agricultural  industry.  We  must  take  into 
account  the  good  and  bad  harvests  and  the  varying  wages  of  the 
different  seasons.  During  the  harvest  period  wages  have  in 
certain  years  risen  almost  to  fifty  cents  a  day,  and  in  the  worst 
years  they  have  fallen  only  about  as  low  as  twenty-five.  But 
we  must  take  into  account  the  long  spring  and  winter  seasons 
when  the  wages  have  varied  from  nine  to  twelve  and  a  half  cents 
per  day.  We  can  indicate  the  fundamental  condition  that 
underlies  such  starvation  wages  by  remembering  that  the  product 
for  a  farm  worker  in  the  United  States  has  risen  in  the  last 
decade  by  nearly  half,  while  that  of  the  Russian  worker  has 
fallen  to  a  little  more  than  half  what  it  was.  Russia's  hundred 
million  people  employed  in  agriculture  are  producing  crops  that, 
at  the  most  liberal  estimate,  have  only  a  fifth  of  the  value  of 
those  produced  by  less  than  fifty  million  people  in  the  United 
States.  With  the  aid  of  oiu*  railroads,  education,  and  farm 
machinery,  a  single  American  farmer  is  producing  crops  as 
valuable  as  those  produced  by  ten  Russian  peasants,  while 
he  is  actually  receiving  as  much  as  fifteen  or  twenty. 

There  is  a  glaring  inequality  in  the  distribution  of  such 
wealth  as  Russia  does  manage  to  produce.  The  Government 
and  the  landlords  take  nearly  half  of  the  peasants'  product; 
and,  furthermore,  in  order  to  retain  their  large  share  of  the 
spoils,  the  Government  and  the  landlords  will  not  allow  the 
peasants  enough  income  even  to  develop  their  agriculture. 
With  a  free  government,  as  in  America,  and  the  land  in  the 
possession  of  the  rural  workers  themselves,  Russia  would  now 


3  -^ 

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HOW  THE   PEASANTS   TILL  SOIL  191 

be  producing  tenfold  the  agricultural  wealth  she  does  to-day. 
And  if  the  people  had  possessed  liberty  and  the  land  a  century 
ago  the  social  problem  in  Russia  would  not  be  other  than  it  is 
now  in  the  United  States. 

But  this  opportunity  has  passed.  The  social  evil  has  now 
become  deeper  in  Russia  than  in  any  other  modem  country, 
the  social  problem  has  become  greater,  and  the  solution  of 
this  problem  will  have  to  be  correspondingly  more  revolutionary 
and  more  profotmd. 


CHAPTER  V 

FROM  SLAVES  OP  THE  LANDLORD  TO  SLAVES  OF  THE  STATE 

And  as  for  the  activity  of  landlords,  nobody  would  even  attempt  to 
justify  it. — Tolstoi,  "What  Is  to  Be  Done." 

WHITE  slavery  has  been  the  basis  of  the  Russian  State 
for  a  thousand  years.  The  so-called  revolutionary 
change  that  took  place  at  the  time  of  the  emancipation  of  the 
serfs  in  1861  by  Alexander  II.  was  no  more  than  a  change  of 
the  system  of  servitude.  Before  that  time  a  part  of  the  peasants 
had  been  the  slaves  directly  of  the  landlords  and  only  indirectly 
of  the  State.  By  the  emancipation  they  became  directly  the 
slaves  of  the  State.  The  overwhelming  majority  of  the  Russian 
people,  of  absolutely  the  same  blood  as  the  landlord  nobility,  in 
this  country  where  all  are  levelled  before  the  Czar  and  a  nobleman 
may  be  created  overnight,  were  not  merely  serfs  but  slaves 
in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  term.  For  the  so-called  serfdom 
that  prevailed  for  two  centuries  before  the  emancipation  was 
nothing  less  than  slavery.  To  be  sure,  the  greater  part  of  the 
peasants  tilling  the  soil  had  some  sort  of  a  guaranteed  legal 
relation  to  the  land.  But  this  was  purely  a  matter  of  con- 
venience. It  was  possible  for  the  landlords  and  the  Government 
to  transfer  them  at  any  time  into  the  class  of  domestic  slaves, 
who  were  also  called  by  the  same  name  of  serf. 

After  the  fixing  of  the  peasants  to  the  soil  over  two  centuries 
ago,  which  was  the  beginning  of  the  new  slavery,  serfdom, 
there  was  a  continuous  contest  between  the  Czar  and  the 
landlords  as  to  which  should  exercise  the  dominant  r61e  over 
the  slaves.  Of  course  there  was  never  any  question  that  the 
landlord  noblemen  also  were  the  slaves  of  the  Czar,  and  that 
the  serfs  were  therefore  the  slaves  of  slaves.  But  there  were 
always  many  matters  of  state  which  hung  on  the  question  as 
to  how  far  the  Czar  should  interfere  directly  in  the  behaviour  of 

192 


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SLAVES   OF   LANDLORD   OR   STATE  193 

the  masters  toward  the  slaves,  and  concerning  the  extent  to  which 
he  should  exercise  directly  his  power  over  them. 

Both  Catharine  IL  and  Alexander  L,  over  a  century  ago,  saw 
that  the  landlords  were  becoming  such  despotic  masters  that 
they  were  starving  their  own  slaves  and  depopulating  the 
country,  to  say  nothing  of  other  vices  of  the  system  which 
threatened  the  State's  very  existence.  Both  monarchs  saw 
that  the  serfs  must  be  ultimately  "free"  —  that  is,  they  under- 
stood that  the  welfare  of  the  country  required  a  single  form  of 
slavery  instead  of  both  Czarism  and  serfdom,  two  systems  that 
contradict  each  other  at  many  points.  For  a  long  time  serfdom, 
or  servitude  to  the  landlords,  was  maintained.  In  spite  of 
the  foresight  of  the  more  intelligent  Czars,  they  valued  the 
support  and  aid  furnished  them  by  the  landlords  even  more 
than  they  did  the  health  or  even  the  existence  of  the  common 
man.  When  the  emancipation  was  finally  enacted  it  meant 
only  a  partial  accompUshment  of  the  Czar's  design  of  replacing 
slavery  to  the  individual  by  slavery  to  the  State;  for  while 
poUtically  the  landlord  masters  lost  their  old  position,  the 
emancipation  was  accomplished  in  such  a  way,  as  I  shall  show, 
as  to  make  the  peasantry  economically  more  dependent  than 
ever  on  the  landlord  class. 

The  contest  between  two  systems,  an  oligarchy  of  slave- 
owning  noblemen  and  a  slave-holding  bureaucratic  absolutism 
with  all  the  power  centred  in  the  Czar,  has  been  a  burning  one 
from  the  outset.  After  the  two  hundred  years  of  this  contest 
that  have  elapsed  since  the  reign  of  Peter  the  Great,  it  is  still 
impossible  to  say  whether  the  autocracy  or  the  oUgarchy  of 
landlords  has  at  last  come  out  the  stronger.  We  have  just  seen 
the  creation  of  a  landlords'  Duma.  Under  Peter  the  Great  the 
landlord  nobility  was  absolutely  crushed,  and  every  individual 
nobleman  that  arose  into  any  prominence,  whether  Menchikov, 
Biren,  or  Munich,  was  exiled,  imprisoned,  or  executed.  It 
might  appear  from  this  that  the  power  of  the  nobiUty  was 
increasing,  but  such  is  not  the  case.  The  victory  fluctuates  from 
one  to  another  in  each  succeeding  reign,  and  after  viewing  the  two 
centuries  as  a  whole  we  must  rather  conclude  that  all  such  conflict 
is  equally  unprofitable  for  both  sides,  and  that  the  autocracy 
and  nobility  are  absolutely  necessary  to  one  another's  existence. 


194  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

A  few  years  after  the  death  of  Peter  the  Great,  in  1730,  the 
Empress  Anne  even  signed  a  sort  of  constitution  granting  a 
noblemen's  government.  There  was  to  have  been  an  assembly 
of  gentlemen,  merchants,  and  the  lesser  nobility,  a  senate  of  the 
higher  nobility,  and  a  supreme  council  of  twelve  which  was 
always  to  be  consulted  on  questions  of  peace  and  war,  taxation, 
the  appointment  of  officials  and  the  condemnation  of  the 
nobility  or  confiscation  of  their  property,  and  even  on  the 
alienation  of  the  Crown  domains,  the  marriages  of  the  royal 
princes  and  the  fixing  of  the  principles  of  succession.  The 
Empress  was  to  have  a  fixed  sum  for  her  household  and  was  to 
command  only  the  Palace  Guards.  Ten  days  after  yielding  to 
the  landlords  Anne  tore  this  instrument  to  pieces.  It  had  proved 
impossible  to  maintain  any  unity  among  the  nobility  and  the 
nobles  saw  then,  as  they  had  often  seen  before  and  since,  that 
the  autocracy  was  a  necessary  method  of  maintaining  their 
domination  in  the  country  —  sorry  as  they  might  be  to  have  to 
be  forced  to  admit  a  despot  above  themselves. 

All  the  palace  revolutions,  those  of  1740  and  1741,  of  1762 
when  Catharine  II.  got  rid  of  her  husband,  of  1801  when 
Alexander  I.  allowed  his  father  to  be  assassinated,  were  revolu- 
tions accomplished  by  the  nobility  for  their  own  ends.  At  the 
same  time  the  nobles  had  been  taught  by  experience,  and  their 
purpose  was  merely  the  naming  of  a  new  autocrat.  They 
had  learned  that  the  Czarism  is  as  necessary  to  themselves  as 
it  is  to  the  Czar.  Catharine  II.,  indeed,  moved  in  an  opposite 
direction  from  Peter  and  Anne;  although  she  did  not  limit  her 
own  power  directly  she  did  the  same  thing  indirectly  by  making 
the  landlords  absolute  masters  over  the  peasantry.  Under 
her  grandson,  Alexander  I,  the  severity  used  against  the  masses 
was  even  greater  than  before,  and  the  peasants'  complaints  were 
not  even  tolerated.  Alexander's  chief  favourite,  Arakcheev, 
led  in  the  tortures  until  he  was  finally  murdered  by  his  own 
slaves. 

Alexander  I.,  who  reigned  at  the  beginning  of  the  last  century, 
was  one  of  the  Czars  who  felt  inclined  rather  to  reduce  chattel 
slavery  in  order  to  strengthen  the  servitude  to  the  State;  but, 
unfortunately,  he  had  enjoyed  such  a  good  education  that  he 
also  understood  the  absurdity  of  the  State  despotism.     Hesi- 


SLAVES   OF    LANDLORD   OR   STATE  195 

tating  for  a  while  between  the  reform  of  these  two  evils,  he  was 
finally  caught  in  the  wave  of  reaction  that  spread  over  Europe 
and  accomplished  neither.  In  the  meanwhile  his  insight  into 
the  impossibility  of  absolutism  led  him  to  maintain  the  power 
of  the  landlord  class. 

One  of  the  books  that  did  the  most  to  bring  about  the 
emancipation  was  "The  Annals  of  a  Sportsman"  by  Turgeniev, 
whom  many  think  the  greatest  novelist  the  world  has  ever 
produced.  In  order  to  give  an  idea  of  the  condition  in  which 
the  fathers  and  grandfathers  of  the  peasants  were  held,  and  of 
the  opinions  in  which  the  present  officials  and  landlords  have 
been  educated,  I  shall  draw  upon  a  few  stories  from  this  book, 
which  was  recognised  by  all  the  contemporaries  to  be  eminently 
moderate  and  fair  in  its  judgments.  Though  Turgeniev 
pictures  a  number  of  typical  landlords,  I  shall  refer  only  to  the 
more  humane  ones. 

As  a  sportsman  Turgeniev 's  attention  was  especially  called 
to  proprietors  who  summoned  peasants  from  their  daily  labour 
to  use  them  as  huntsmen.  This  shows  that  the  so-called 
serfdom  was  nothing  but  slavery.  It  was  slavery,  as  Turgeniev 
mentioned,  because  the  landlords  had  the  right  to  judge  the 
peasants  and  to  send  them  to  exile  or  imprisonment  for  life  in 
the  military  battalions.  The  landlords  drawn  by  Turgeniev 
took  advantage  of  their  position  to  rob  the  peasants  of  land 
which  they  were  supposed  to  have  a  right  to  cultivate.  Even 
this  right  to  work  on  a  certain  piece  of  land,  the  very  basis  of 
serfdom  and  the  only  feature  that  separates  it  from  mere  slavery, 
was  all  but  ignored.  In  one  case  robbery  had  been  accomp- 
lished by  ceaseless  beatings,  and  the  land  in  dispute  was  referred 
to  by  the  peasants  in  the  neighbourhood  as  the  "cudgelled 
land." 

Since  serfdom  was  supposed  to  differ  in  some  respects  from 
slavery,  of  course  it  was  not  supposed  that  the  landlords  had 
a  right  to  allow  and  forbid  the  peasants  to  marry,  but  this  right 
also  they  assumed.  Turgeniev  speaks  of  one  cruel  master  who 
forbade  all  his  maids  to  marry  and  had  cruelly  punished  any- 
one who  disobeyed ;  he  relates  the  story  of  a  peasant  lover  who 
was  sent  away  for  twenty-five  years  to  the  ruin  of  the  whole 
family  which  was  supported  by  him  alone;  and  he  tells  of  an 


196  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

old-maid  mistress  who  never  allowed  any  of  her  serfs,  male  or 
female,  to  marry.  "God  forbid,"  she  sometimes  said,  "here 
I  am  living  single;  what  indulgence!  what  are  they  thinking  of!" 

The  most  cruel  of  the  masters  were  under  no  illusions  as  to 
whether  the  system  in  existence  was  serfdom  or  slavery.  "When 
a  man's  a  master  he  is  a  master,"  explains  one  of  them,  who 
had  advised  every  manner  of  torture  for  his  slaves,  "and  when 
he  is  a  peasant,  he  is  a  peasant."  But  what  is  the  most  inter- 
esting for  our  purpose,  is  that  when  the  slaves  were  most  dis- 
obedient and  the  masters  most  cruelly  aroused,  they  spoke  not 
of  a  slaves'  revolt,  but  of  a  "mutiny."  In  other  words,  the 
most  extreme  form  of  servitude  that  these  slave-owners  could 
imagine  was  military  servitude,  the  most  extreme  form  of 
insubordination  was  military  mutiny  —  that  is,  revolt  not 
against  private  ownership  but  against  the  State,  which  was 
after  all  the  more  oppressive  master  at  that  time  and  has 
remained  so  until  the  present  day. 

Turgeniev  hesitated  to  present  in  a  work  intended  for  general 
reading  a  full  picture  of  the  frightful  degree  which  the  oppression 
at  that  time  had  reached.  But  we  must  understand  this  if  we 
are  to  understand  the  character  of  the  present  rulers  of  the 
country.  The  cruelties  that  follow  are  all  supported  by  docu- 
mentary evidence. 

The  proprietors  were  allowed  to  make  their  own  laws  for 
the  most  part  as  far  as  the  peasants  were  concerned.  One 
such  law  read  as  follows:  "For  insulting  a  neighbouring  pro- 
prietor—  to  be  whipped  cruelly:"  another,  "if  a  serf  omits 
to  fast  at  the  proper  time  and  for  a  period  ordained  by  the 
Church,  he  or  she  must  fast  for  a  week  and  receive  five  thousand 
strokes  unsparingly."  The  preceding  are  from  the  private 
law-books.  There  is  one  from  the  public  army  regulations, 
chapter  29,  that  requires  that  the  court  must  examine  carefully 
in  the  case  of  a  peasant's  death  why  he  died  so  easily  and  how 
it  was  possible  for  him  to  die  so  easily.  The  public  laws  set  the 
example,  and  we  must  remember  that  half  of  the  serfs  were  not 
owned  by  private  proprietors  but  by  the  Czar  himself.  Cath- 
arine II.  issued  an  order  that  the  serfs  were  not  to  be  permitted 
to  complain  to  their  masters,  and  when  some  peasants  begged 
that  they  be  killed  or  exiled  forever  rather  than  be  left  to  the 


SLAVES   OF   LANDLORD   OR   STATE  197 

mercies  of  their  master,  Count  Alexis  Lapuchin,  Catharine  ordered 
•'half  of  them  to  be  whipped  publicly  with  rods  in  the  market- 
place and  other  squares  in  Moscow,  and  the  other  half  to  be 
whipped  in  the  villages  in  presence  of  the  peasants;  and  then 
sent  them  to  hard  labour  in  the  Siberian  mines."* 

When  cases  against  the  peasants  did  come  up  for  trial  they 
were  judged  of  course  by  the  landlords  themselves.  A  certain 
Redkin,  marshal  of  the  nobility  in  the  Government  of  Riazan, 
said  frankly:  "If  I  saw  a  gentleman  who  is  my  comrade  kill 
one  of  his  serfs  I  would  take  an  oath  without  any  scruple  that 
I  had  seen  nothing."  This  from  the  chief  of  the  nobility  of  a 
whole  province. 

The  slavery  of  white  men  of  the  same  blood  as  their  masters 
is  even  more  demoralising  than  the  slavery  of  another  race 
that  the  whites  can  imagine  inferior  to  their  own.  This  demoral- 
isation in  Russia  knew  no  bounds.  A  certain  nobleman  had  his 
manager  present  to  him  on  the  day  of  his  arrival  at  his  estate 
each  year,  a  list  of  all  the  adult  young  women  of  the  two  villages 
under  the  manager's  authority.  This  gentleman  then  took 
each  one  of  these  girls  into  his  seignorial  mansion  as  a  servant, 
and  when  the  list  was  exhausted  he  went  to  another  one  of  his 
estates.  The  same  story  repeated  itself  year  after  year.  This, 
like  the  other  cases  I  shall  relate,  is  given  by  the  best  known  and 
most  reliable  of  the  Russian  historians.  One  of  these  servant 
women  belonging  to  a  proprietor  named  Karteev  tried  to  escape. 
He  had  her  whipped  and  put  a  collar  with  iron  points  on  it  around 
her  neck.  The  unfortunate  woman  tried  to  drown  herself 
but  did  not  succeed,  and  the  proprietor  captured  her  again. 
He  then  had  her  foot  chained  to  a  post  in  the  kitchen,  and  she 
was  kept  this  way  for  five  years  until  finally  she  was  unchained 
in  order  to  be  allowed  to  work  in  the  fields  of  the  proprietor. 
This  case  of  chaining  peasants  up  like  dogs  was  repeated  else- 
where, although  sometimes  the  chain  was  placed  around  the 
peasant's  neck. 

One  proprietor,  Sau  Kanov,  killed  a  boy  of  twelve  years  for 
having  let  a  hare  escape  on  a  hunt.  He  felled  the  lad  with  a 
stroke  of  his  bayonet,  and  continued  the  attack  by  kicking 
him  in  the  stomach  and  chest.     The  boy  died  the  same  day. 

♦See  Keimard,  Chapter  II. 


198  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  inquiry  undertaken  by  gentlemen  landlords  discovered 
nothing.  The  doctor  did  not  find  any  traces  on  the  body, 
and  the  peasants  kept  a  profound  silence,  terrorised  by  the  prom- 
ise of  Sau  Kanov  to  flay  alive  whoever  should  dare  utter  a  single 
word  against  him.  But  the  inquiry  was  again  taken  up,  and 
this  time  the  council  of  State  brought  out  the  truth. 

It  is  impossible  to  imagine  all  the  methods  and  instruments 
of  torture  that  were  in  use  on  various  estates.  In  the  govern- 
ment of  Saratov  there  is  a  document  in  the  archives  that  de- 
scribes some  of  them.  From  the  list  of  hundreds  the  following 
are  interesting:  beating  with  salted  sticks  and  rubbing  salt 
into  the  wounds ;  putting  on  collars  of  iron  with  nails  inside ; 
beating  with  rawhide  whips;  burning  the  hair  of  women 
down  to  the  skin;  boiling  in  a  caldron;  roasting  on  red-hot 
grills.  In  this  same  government  a  proprietor  named  Garasky 
beat  his  steward  so  hard  in  the  chest  that  the  man  died  within 
a  week.  Police  agents  coming  to  make  a  search  in  the  village 
found  various  instruments  of  torture  in  the  proprietors'  houses 
—  a  collar,  chains,  handcuffs,  a  mask  that  was  placed  over 
the  head  of  the  peasant  and  then  locked  in  order  to  rob  him 
of  the  possibility  of  eating.  This  latter  end,  by  the  way,  is 
accomplished  much  better  at  the  present  time  when  the  peasant 
has  only  half  as  much  land  as  he  had  before  the  emancipation, 
and  is  more  effectually  placed  at  the  disposition  of  his  economic 
masters  without  the  proprietor  being  forced  to  take  any  direct 
action. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  these  white  slaves  quietly 
accepted  their  servitude.  The  tradition  of  the  days  when 
they  had  had  much  greater  freedom  still  lived  on,  and  they 
knew  that  they  were  the  same  flesh  and  blood  as  their  masters; 
but  the  means  of  revolt  were  narrowly  limited  and  the  first 
reaction  among  the  peasants  was  usually  desperate.  Suicides 
were  frequent,  very  many  thousands  taking  place  every  year, 
sometimes  in  the  most  spectacular  manner.  One  coachman 
belonging  to  a  paralysed  landlord  drove  the  latter  into  a  forest 
and  hung  himself  before  his  master's  eyes  to  a  bare  tree,  leaving 
him  alone  and  helpless  until  he  was  able  to  call  others  to  take 
him  home  —  a  Strang  vengeance  on  the  landlord  by  a  servant 
who  for  several  decades  had  suffered  unbearable  tortures. 


SLAVES   OF   LANDLORD   OR   STATE  199 

Of  course  it  often  happened  that  the  peasants  killed  the 
nobleman  instead  of  themselves.  Hardly  a  month  passed 
that  some  such  attempt  of  murder  did  not  succeed  and  reach 
the  ears  of  the  public.  How  many  murders  were  done,  how 
many  attempted,  without  being  disclosed,  will  never  be  known. 
In  the  peasants'  defence  it  must  be  recalled  that  the  Czars 
condemned  to  the  most  terrible  punishment  any  peasant  that 
even  had  the  audacity  to  complain  against  his  proprietor. 

Later  I  shall  show  how  this  slavery  continues  to-day  imder  a 
new  form.  But  first  I  shall  touch  upon  the  other  form  of 
slavery  that  existed  before  the  emancipation,  that  is,  slavery 
to  the  State.  This  served  also  as  the  historical  foundation 
of  the   present  servitude. 

Nicholas  L  was  the  monarch  who  developed  this  form  of 
slavery  to  its  height.  He  was  the  son  of  a  very  stupid  German 
woman  and  was  penetrated  to  the  bottom  of  his  soul  with 
monarchial  and  religious  prejudices.  Although  his  successor 
was  forced  to  introduce  the  Emancipation  Act,  Nicholas  was 
violently  opposed  to  it,  and  developed  the  country  in  the 
opposite  direction.  For  while  he  did  not  believe  that  the 
landlords  should  themselves  exercise  much  power,  he  was  in 
favour  of  slavery  as  a  general  principle,  and  saw  that  it  was 
necessary  to  lend  the  landlords  some  of  his  autocratic  power. 
He  did  this  against  his  will,  for  his  favourite  tyranny  was  of  a 
purely  military  character. 

He  himself  confessed  that  he  and  his  brother  Michael  had 
received-  a  very  poor  education,  that  "even  in  the  matter  of 
religion  we  had  been  taught  only  to  make  the  sign  of  the  cross 
at  certain  moments,  to  go  to  Mass  and  to  recite  by  heart  a  few 
prayers  without  taking  the  slightest  interest  in  what  was  going 
on  in  our  souls."  The  sciences  were  completely  neglected,  and 
while  the  teacher  was  trying  to  instruct  the  children  they  were 
drawing  caricatures.  All  their  education,  all  their  play  even, 
had  for  its  only  end  the  development  of  a  taste  for  military 
exercise.  This  confession,  written  by  Nicholas  for  his  own 
children,  shows  the  way  in  which  the  characters  and  souls  of 
Czars  are  formed. 

From  this  training  Nicholas  became,  according  to  the  historian 
Childere,     coarse,     rude,     haughty,     and     presumptuous.     He 


200  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

showed  his  hatred  on  every  occasion  of  all  that  was  liberal, 
and  his  love  for  Prussian  military  despotism.  While  on  his 
visit  to  England  he  did  not  wish  even  to  see  the  Parliament  or 
to  make  the  acquaintance  of  English  statesmen;  he  passed  all 
his  time  with  officers  and  generals.  In  Prussia  he  delighted 
only  in  military  parades  and  reviewing  the  army  with  his  father- 
in-law,  the  King  of  Prussia.  Dressed  in  the  uniform  of  a 
Prussian  regiment,  he  said  to  the  soldiers,  "Never  forget,  my 
friends,  that  I  am  half  your  countryman  and  that  like  you  I  am 
a  member  of  the  army  of  your  King."  Perhaps  this  was  what 
gave  rise  to  the  Russian  couplet,  popular  at  that  time: 

The  Czar's  a  German  Russian, 
His  uniform  is  Prussian. 

It  was  this  same  military  Emperor  who  tried  to  revive  the 
Holy  Alliance  in  1848,  and  to  help  all  the  kings  of  Europe  to 
put  down  the  democratic  movements  of  their  subjects;  and  it 
was  this  same  haughty  military  despot  that  met  his  defeat  at 
the  hands  of  the  liberal  French  and  English  in  the  Crimean 
War,  and  died  probably  of  shame  as  the  result. 

It  was  a  Czar  of  this  soulless  military  type  that  brought 
the  State  slavery  to  its  highest  point  of  development.  So  far 
did  he  go  that  it  was  necessary  first  of  all  that  he  should  prevent 
all  intellectual  development  among  his  subjects,  since  his 
actions  were  such  that  no  intelligent  man  could  tolerate,  them. 
He  forbade  all  discussions  in  the  press  on  the  subject  of  the 
Government.  He  created  not  one  office  of  censorship  but  a 
dozen  —  the  ecclesiastic,  the  military,  the  educational,  the 
judicial,  the  political,  the  ministers'  and  the  secret.  When  a 
distingtiished  citizen  asked  to  be  allowed  to  start  a  review,  the 
Emperor  replied  curtly:  "There  is  no  need  for  it."  The 
minister  of  foreign  affairs  ordered  that,  in  articles  on  any  of  the 
foreign  countries,  the  Russian  press  should  not  even  print  the 
words  "  parliament,"  "constitution,"  or  "elections,"  and 
should  not  mention  the  demands,  or  even  the  needs,  of  the  for- 
eign working  class.  The  minister  of  interior  affairs  ordered,  in 
his  turn,  that  there  shotdd  be  no  description  of  the  needs^or 
calamities  of  the  Russian  people  or  of  any  contemporary  event 
that  might  excite  the  population,  that  no  regret  should  be 
expressed  concerning  the  position  of  the  peasant  serfs,   and 


SLAVES   OF   LANDLORD   OR   STATE  201 

that  there  should  be  no  description  of  the  proprietors'  abuses 
of  their  authority.  The  minister  of  education  ordered  that 
there  should  be  no  mention  of  the  historic  facts  that  there  had 
been  struggles  for  freedom  in  Greece  and  Rome,  and  no  mention 
of  the  names  of  the  heroes  of  those  struggles.  In  an  historical 
work  on  Greek  history  the  censor  would  not  even  permit  to  a 
former  minister  to  make  use  of  the  Greek  word  "Demos," 
commanding  that  it  be  replaced  by  some  other  word.  Recog- 
nising how  much  Nicholas  L  had  in  common  with  Ivan  the 
Terrible,  the  deviltries  of  the  latter  were  not  allowed  to  be 
mentioned  in  Russian  histories.  Let  us  remember  that  all 
these  measures  belong  to  but  a  little  more  than  a  half  century 
ago,  and  that  conditions  are  in  many  respects  similar  at  the 
present  moment. 

Nicholas,  however,  went  a  little  farther  than  any  other  Czars 
in  his  fight  against  intelligence.  "His  object,"  says  a  Russian 
historian,  "seemed  to  be  to  enslave  the  people  intellectually 
and  to  extinguish  their  souls."  "Imagine,"  says  another, 
"an  enormous  and  solid  prison,  a  prison  for  forced  labour 
constructed  purposely  to  contain  all  the  peasants  of  Russia, 
and  around  this  prison  sentinels  with  loaded  guns,  and  you  will 
have  an  exact  image  of  the  whole  policy  of  Nicholas  I.  as  far 
as  the  peasants  are  concerned."  Of  course  a  man  who  thus 
treated  the  whole  nation,  considered  the  peasants  to  be  not 
only  less  than  men  but  merely  pieces  of  wood,  objects  even 
rather  than  beasts. 

Under  Nicholas  the  State  had  ten  million  slaves  directly 
belonging  to  it.  We  are  interested  not  only  in  its  behaviour 
toward  this  half  of  the  peasantry,  but  also  toward  the  enor- 
mous standing  army  and  the  million  of  other  slaves  that  were 
employed  directly  or  indirectly  by  the  Government.  Although 
the  State  did  not  as  a  rule  deal  in  human  flesh  commercially, 
yet  this  practice  also  existed.  The  Crown  paid  300  rubles  a 
head  for  every  young  man  that  it  was  allowed  to  send  to  colo- 
nise Siberia,  and  it  was  very  common  for  peasants  to  be  sold  to 
take  the  place  of  other  recruits  under  the  ironical  name  always 
of  "volunteers." 

I  have  already  mentioned  that  the  soldiers  were  slaves  of 
the  lowest  order  for  the  twenty-five  years  of  their  service,  that 


202  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

all  the  Government  employees  in  the  post-office  and  other 
departments,  as  well  as  in  the  mines,  were  nothing  less  than 
slaves,  and  that  the  State  also  permitted  the  manufacturers 
to  deal  with  their  employees  in  an  utterly  arbitrary  manner. 
So  we  see  that  on  the  whole  the  State  was  a  much  more  im- 
portant master  of  serfs  than  all  the  landlords  put  together. 
Against  the  State  there  was  another  desperate  remedy  besides 
suicide  and  the  killing  of  a  few  cruel  masters.  This  remedy 
was  revolt,  such  as  has  been  in  practice  for  Russia  during 
centuries  and  is  going  on  at  the  present  moment  all  over  the 
Empire 

In  1 841  four  himdred  persons  organised  a  resistance  to  the 
soldiers,  and  thirty-three  were  killed  and  one  hundred  and  four- 
teen wounded.  Here  was  a  little  pitched  battle  of  the  same  kind 
as  has  occurred  so  frequently  in  recent  years.  In  1842,  in  the 
government  of  Kasan,  the  authorities  wanted  to  force  the 
peasants  belonging  to  the  Crown  to  plough  the  land  in  common. 
Eight  were  killed,  two  hundred  and  thirty  wounded  and  four 
hundred  and  twenty  taken  before  the  military  courts.  Then, 
year  after  year,  until  the  emancipation  in  1861,  there  were 
twenty  to  forty  revolts,  more  frequent  of  course  on  the  small 
and  numerous  estates  of  the  proprietors,  but  of  a  far  more 
serious  import  on  the  large  properties  of  the  Government. 
It  was  because  he  was  frightened  at  these  revolts,  as  Nicholas  I. 
confessed,  that  he  began  to  consider  the  question  of  emancipa- 
tion, though  he  finally  decided  against  it. 

The  State  Council  discussions  upon  emancipation  are 
interesting  as  showing  the  intimate  and  interdependent  relations 
of  the  landlords  and  the  Crown.  Although  Nicholas  confessed 
that  the  "present  position  cannot  continue  forever,"  he  said 
also,  "I  shall  never  decide  for  the  emancipation."  The  reason 
he  thought  conditions  could  not  continue,  he  said  frankly,  was 
the  spirit  of  revolt  among  the  peasants.  A  councillor  of  state, 
seeing  a  little  further  ahead  than  Nicholas,  proposed  a  plan  of 
emancipation  by  which  the  landlord-noblemen  friends  of  the 
Czar  should  not  suffer.  "In  order  that  the  peasants  to  Jbe 
deprived  of  land  shall  not  escape  the  labour  of  gentlemen," 
he  said,  "when  emancipated  they  should  form  a  class  of 
obUgatory  peasants  who  should  not  have  the  right  to  change 


SLAVES   OF   LANDLORD   OR   STATE  203 

their  place  of  residence  without  the  permission  of  the  author- 
ities." This  is  exactly  what  was  finally  done,  and  it  had  the 
desired  result.  For  if  the  landlord  owns  the  larger  part  of  the 
land  and  the  peasants  are  not  permitted  to  leave  the  village, 
they  have  no  choice  but  to  work  for  him  at  his  own  terms  or 
to  starve.  The  proprietor  might  lose  a  few  slave  house- 
servants  by  the  new  system,  but  he  would  probably  be  better 
served  with  labour  on  the  land.  Councillors  still  more 
conservative  feared  that  the  Government  would  not  be  able 
to  gather  taxes  regularly,  and  insisted  that  the  peasants  should 
have  a  certain  amount  of  land,  but  should  be  forced  to  pay  a 
tax  beyond  their  power  to  the  landlords.  This  amendment 
was  also  accepted,  with  the  modification  that  the  Government 
instead  of  the  landlords  collected  these  taxes.  As  the  proposer 
of  this  amendment  claimed  would  be  the  case,  the  peasants 
were  thus  obliged  to  work  all  their  lives  for  the  proprietor,  with 
the  advantage  for  the  State  and  the  public  peace  that  the 
amount  contributed  was  determined  once  for  all  by  the  law. 

The  State  was  probably  persuaded  to  undertake  the 
emancipation  by  three  considerations:  First,  the  necessity  of 
promoting  the  prosperity  of  the  peasants  in  order  to  get  a  new 
source  of  taxation  for  itself,  so  pressing  after  the  disastrous 
Crimean  War;  secondly,  in  order  to  make  possible  the  change 
from  a  small  professional  army  to  an  army  of  the  whole  people, 
in  which  of  course  patriotism  as  well  as  military  terror  must 
be  a  part  of  the  soldiers'  discipline;  and  thirdly,  in  order  to 
prevent  the  proprietors  from  literally  eating  up  the  peasantry 
and  depopulating  the  country  —  for  many  of  the  landlords, 
after  squeezing  the  last  penny  out  of  the  peasants,  spent  every- 
thing on  riotous  living,  invested  nothing  in  agriculture,  and 
were  either  unable  or  unwilling  even  to  keep  their  peasants 
aHve  in  famine  times. 

Such  was  the  benefit  received  by  the  State.  I  shall  now 
speak  of  the  profit  received  by  the  proprietors.  Let  us  recall, 
however,  that  whatever  profited  the  nobility  profited  the  State 
also.  The  Emperor  Paul  loved  to  repeat  that  the  State  had  in 
the  one  hundred  thousand  noblemen  one  hundred  thousand 
voluntary  chiefs  of  police.  The  councillor  of  Nicholas  J.  whom 
I  have  just  quoted,  the  Minister  of  Public  Instructions  Ourvarov, 


204  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

said  of  serfdom,  "This  tree  has  taken  a  profound  root;  it  shades 
both  the  Church  and  the  Throne." 

Although  it  was  decided  that  it  was  impossible  to  give  the 
peasants  freedom  without  giving  them  land  on  which  to  live, 
nevertheless  a  very  large  portion  received  either  no  land  or 
so  little  that  it  was  impossible  for  them  to  keep  themselves 
alive  without  another  occupation.  Seven  hundred  thousand 
domestics  who  before  the  emancipation  were  supposed  to  have 
the  same  claim  as  other  peasants  to  a  share  of  the  land,  were 
deprived  definitely  of  all  rights  at  this  time ;  one  hundred  and  sixty 
thousand  other  peasants  were  left  landless  without  any  excuse 
being  offered;  six  hundred  thousand  received  the  so-called  "beg- 
gar's lots. "  The  extent  of  these  lots  was  only  one-fourth  of  the 
land  the  peasants  had  formerly  tilled,  the  other  three-fourths 
being  left  for  the  first  time  in  the  absolute  possession  and 
ownership  of  the  landlords,  unburdened  by  the  duty  of  supporting 
as  formerly  the  peasants  that  had  been  legally  attached  to  the 
soil.  Of  the  remaining  four  million  households  (the  other  four 
and  a  half  million  were  the  previously  mentioned  serfs  of  the 
State),  one-half  received  allotments  so  small  that  according  to 
the  law  of  the  Government  itself,  they  would  have  had  the  right 
before  the  emancipation  to  be  sent  away  to  some  new  section  of 
the  coimtry. 

In  all  sections  where  the  land  was  more  valuable  the 
peasants  fell  into  one  or  another  of  the  above  classes.  In  the 
east  and  south,  where  the  land  was  both  rich  and  comparatively 
new,  having  been  under  cultivation  only  a  few  decades,  the 
peasants  lost  from  one-fifth  to  one-half,  and  even  more,  of  all 
their  property.  In  the  equally  rich  but  older  centre  of  the 
country,  they  lost  in  every  province,  sometimes  as  much  as 
20  per  cent.  If  we  look  at  the  total  amount  of  land  in 
possession  of  the  peasants  and  proprietors  at  this  time,  we 
find  that  one  hundred  thousand  landlords  still  were  in  posses- 
sion of  almost  as  much  of  the  land  as  twenty  million  peasants. 

The  landlords  gained,  then,  both  by  obtaining  cheaper  and 
more  reliable  labour  and  by  getting  possession  of  large  amounts 
of  land  formerly  in  the  peasants'  hands.  But  this  was  not  all. 
Whatever  power  over  the  person  of  the  peasants  they  had  lost 
was  handed  over  to  the  police,  who  were  also  controlled  either 


SLAVES   OF    LANDLORD   OR   STATE  205 

directly  by  the  local  landlords  or  through  St.  Petersburg 
bureaus  that  were  on  the  friendliest  terms  with  the  land-owning 
class.  A  typical  law  of  these  bureaus  is  that  of  the  1 2th  of  June, 
i886,whichgivestheemployerthe  right  to  make  deductions  from 
wages  of  the  peasant  for  whatever  he  considered  to  be  negligent 
work  and  even  for  rudeness. 

The  crushing  burden  of  taxation  laid  upon  the  peasantry 
by  the  State  has  also  been  of  tremendous  service  to  the  land- 
lords in  keeping  the  peasants  in  an  utterly  dependent  economic 
condition.  At  the  time  of  the  emancipation  the  peasants  who 
received  the  pitifully  small  allotments  mentioned  were  burdened 
by  the  Czar  with  a  debt  of  almost  nine  hundred  million  rubles, 
one-half  more  than  the  total  value  of  their  land.  Of  course  they 
fell  immediately  into  arrears  —  and  at  the  present  moment, 
according  to  a  statement  made  in  the  Duma,  have  already  paid 
more  than  one  thousand  five  hundred  million  rubles.  So 
crushing  were  these  taxes  which  the  starving  peasants  were 
forced  to  pay  for  freedom,  that  they  often  reached  as  much 
as  50 percent,  of  their  total  net  product,  and  in  the  last  decade 
of  the  nineteenth  century  even  exceeded  the  peasants'  income. 
But  during  this  same  decade  the  amount  of  money  loaned  by 
the  Government  to  the  nobility  below  the  market  rate  of  interest 
increased  from  nine  hundred  million  rubles  in  1890  to  one 
thousand  six  hundred  and  fifty  million  in  1900. 

In  the  meanwhile  landlordism  continued  to  flourish.  Prince 
Galitzin,  grand  equerry  of  the  court,  has  nearly  three  million 
acres;  Prince  Rukavishnikov,  secret  counsel  of  the  ministry 
of  the  interior,  has  nearly  two  million;  Prince  Sheremetiev, 
of  the  Imperial  Council,  has  nearly  half  a  million,  and  so  on. 
To  show  better  the  local  conditions  I  shall  mention  some  of 
the  largest  estates  in  the  miserable  province  of  Poltava,  where 
I  visited  in  the  summer  of  1906.  There,  where  land  is  worth 
about  one  himdred  rubles  an  acre  (fifty  dollars),  the  Duke  of 
Mecklenburg-Strelitz  has  an  estate  worth  about  fifteen  million 
rubles,  Minister  Dumovo's  property  is  worth  about  four  million, 
those  of  the  Princes  Kotzebue,  Bariatinsky,  and  Gortchakov  are 
each  worth  several  millions.  About  one-third  is  in  the  hands  of 
the  rich  or  well-to-do  proprietors,  averaging  more  than  four 
hundred  acres  of  the  valuable  soil;  while  the  majority  of  the 


2o6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

peasants  own  only  from  five  to  twenty -five  acres  per  household, 
and  two  hundred  thousand  have  less  than  five  acres. 

An  examination  of  the  economic  basis  of  Russia's  landlord 
nobility  shows  that  there  are  two  thousand  persons,  largely 
of  princely  rank,  possessed  of  more  than  twenty-five  thousand 
acres,  fifteen  thousand  of  the  higher  nobility  and  persons  of 
corresponding  wealth  possessed  of  from  twenty-five  hundred  to 
twenty-five  thousand  acres,  and  sixty  thousand  of  the  lesser 
nobility  or  gentry  with  two  hundred  and  fifty  to  twenty-five 
hundred  acres.  The  four  hundred  thousand  individual  farmers 
and  other  persons  of  a  similar  class  are  possessed  of  less  than 
two  hundred  and  fifty  acres  each.  We  see  by  these  figiires 
not  only  what  a  power  the  nobility  has  in  the  land,  owning  as  it 
does  one-third  of  the  richest  soil  in  the  country,  but  also  that 
the  land  is  highly  concentrated  even  within  this  class;  for  the 
owners  whom  I  have  called  of  "the  higher  nobility  "are  possessed 
of  twice  as  much  land  as  the  mere  gentry,  while  the  princes  own 
half  as  much  again.  The  gentlemen  taken  altogether  have 
thirteen  times  as  much  land  as  the  middle-class  farmers, 
excluding  the  fifteen  million  peasant  households. 

The  condition  is  not  fully  represented  by  taking  the  country 
as  a  whole.  In  some  parts  the  landlords  are  comparatively 
powerless,  but  in  others  they  own  such  a  large  proportion  of 
the  land,  are  possessed  of  such  large  funds  with  which  to  buy 
the  local  officials  and  police,  that  under  the  Russian  despotic 
system  they  are  nothing  less  than  a  local  oligarchy.  In  all 
the  western  and  southernmost  provinces,  and  in  five  others, 
the  landlords  own  almost  as  much  as,  or  more  than,  the 
peasants.  It  is  in  these  provinces  that  the  massacres  have  been 
organised,  that  the  police  have  practised  the  most  outrages 
in  the  so-called  elections,  that  rents  are  most  exorbitant  and 
that  the  revolts  of  the  peasantry  have  had  the  least  success. 

It  is  impossible,  then,  to  consider  that  the  peasants  have 
ever  been  emancipated.  Fully  one-half  of  them,  those  that 
before  1861  had  belonged  to  the  State,  are  in  approximately 
the  same  situation  now  as  they  were  fifty  years  ago.  The  rest, 
besides  being  subjected  to  the  State  slavery  that  always  over- 
shadowed the  private  serfdom,  are  placed  economically  in  the 
landlords'  hands,  and  this  econoroic  dependence  is  enacted  into 


SLAVES   OF   LANDLORD   OR   STATE  207 

law  by  the  statutes  concerning  wage  contracts,  strikes,  rents 
and  every  other  economic  question.  The  germs  of  reform  that 
are  being  planted  at  the  present  time,  are  not  only  without 
any  chance  of  growing  up  into  something  of  consequence,  but 
they  are  insignificant  compared  to  the  revival  of  the  wholesale 
use  of  direct  violence  on  the  part  of  the  Government  and  the 
landlords,  and  compared  to  the  institution  of  a  regular  civil 
war  against  that  "internal  enemy,"  the  revolted  peasantry. 

Let  us  remember  that  the  Government  and  the  landlords, 
and  all  the  innumerable  writers  and  journalists  in  their  pay 
all  over  the  world,  blame  the  peasants  themselves  for  their 
tragic  condition,  and  that  the  landlords  have  also  managed  to 
cajole  many  serious  persons  into  crediting  their  statement. 
Let  us  then  judge  between  this  standpoint  of  hostility  toward 
the  Russian  people,  and  that  of  the  tens  of  thousands  of  true 
Russians  who  have  devoted  their  whole  lives  to  the  peasantry 
and  who  take  a  diametrically  opposite  point  of  view.  And  then 
let  us  realise  to  the  full  the  criminal  character  of  a  monarch  and 
a  nobility  that  can  sustain  their  self-respect  before  the  modem 
world  only  by  this  most  infamous  campaign  of  lies  against  the 
people  to  whose  exploitation  and  misery  they  owe  their  very 
existence. 


CHAPTER    VI 


THE    PEASANT    GIVES    HIS    ORDERS 


A" 


FTER  the  first  Duma  was  dissolved  it  became  more  clear 
than  ever  that  the  great  revolution  is  something  far 
deeper  than  a  struggle  against  the  absolutism  of  the  Czar.  It  is 
true  that  for  more  than  a  generation  there  has  been  growing  up 
a  strong  agitation  for  political  freedom  —  of  the  American  or 
Western  Europe  type.  This  culminated  in  the  general  strike, 
the  Czar's  October  Manifesto,  the  Constitutional  Democratic 
Party  and  the  Duma.  It  is  also  true  that  until  the  eve  of  its 
dissolution,  the  first  Duma  busied  itself  with  political  rather 
than  social  questions.  The  Constitutional  Democratic  majority 
as  far  as  possible  avoided  the  social  problem  —  the  question 
of  the  ownership  of  the  land.  In  their  party  congress  they 
had  even  omitted  the  land  question  from  their  programme, 
passing  a  mere  resolution  on  the  subject.  In  the  Duma  they 
postponed  it  to  the  last. 

When,  a  few  days  before  the  Duma's  end,  the  clamour  of 
the  peasant  population,  agrarian  disorders  and  the  direct  pres- 
sure of  the  peasant  deputies  forced  the  Constitutional  Demo- 
|/  crats  to  take  up  the  question  that  underlies  the  whole  titanic 
"  ^  revolt,  they  at  once  left  the  revolutionary  tactics  they  had 
followed  when  purely  political  issues  were  at  stake.  From 
political  revolutionism  they  passed,  not  to  social  revolutionism, 
but  to  mere  social  reform.  They  proposed  very  radical 
measures  —  to  provide  the  peasants  with  more  land,  to  seize 
all  the  larger  estates  for  this  purpose,  to  pay  for  them  without 
considering  in  their  evaluation  the  abnormal  rents  extorted  from 
a  hungry  people,  to  abolish  absentee  landlordism,  to  limit  the 
amount  of  land  a  man  can  own  to  what  he  can  himself  superin- 
tend, and  to  see  that  each  peasant  was  provided,  "as  nearly  as 
possible,"  with  the  "alimentary  norm"  of  land  —  enough  to 
furnish  him  means  to  provide  himself  with  food,  shelter,  clothing 

208 


THRESHING    BY    FOOT    AND    BY    FLAIL 


HARVESTING 
The  haying  has  fallen  largely  into  the  hands  of  the  women 


^SITY 


THE   PEASANT   GIVES   HIS   ORDERS  209 

—  and  taxes.  They  denied,  through  the  mouth  of  their  econo- 
mist Herzenstein,  the  possibihty  of  giving  the  peasant  more 
than  the  aUmentary  norm  of  "providing  work  for  all  the  people." 
They  hope,  that  is  to  say,  that  the  peasant  will  not  have  to 
starve,  but  they  despair  of  setting  him  on  the  road  to  prosperity. 
They  expect  that  he  will  be  condemned  to  much  enforced 
idleness  for  the  lack  of  land  —  they  deny  the  possibility  of  the 
rapid  improvement  of  agriculture,  when  they  say  that  he 
cannot  hope  to  have  enough  land  to  accumulate  a  surplus 
capital  of  his  own.  At  the  same  time  they  proclaim  the 
sacredness  and  inviolability  of  private  property,  and  assert 
that  they  stand  not  for  social  revolution,  but  for  social  reform. 

But  the  Russian  revolution  is  not  a  mere  political  struggle 
for  emancipation  from  an  archaic  form  of  government  —  it  is  a 
movement  of  the  masses  of  the  people  to  regenerate  Russian 
society.  An  old  order  is  doomed  —  its  government,  its  rtiling 
caste,  its  ruling  ideas,  its  religion,  its  property,  its  property 
forms,  its  economic  methods  and  its  dominating  social  power. 
The  new  order  cannot  by  any  possibility  be  ushered  in  by  mere 
political  changes  modeled  on  the  political  institutions  of  England 
or  the  United  States.  With  the  autocratic  form  of  government 
will  go  many  of  the  social  wrongs  that  weigh  down  both  the 
peasants  and  the  relatively  more  prosperous  and  more  educated 
people.  Because  the  peasants  are  poor  and  innocent  of  book 
learning  is  no  reason  why,  in  the  great  transformation  that  is 
taking  place,  they  should  lose  all  the  lessons  of  modern  industrial 
development  and  the  other  social  teachings  of  the  hundred 
years  that  have  passed  since  the  revolution  in  France. 

History  is  indeed  preparing  "new  forms  of  human  society," 
as  the  peasant  leader  Anikine  claimed  —  precisely  because  all 
the  great  forces  of  modem  life  are  present  in  the  nation  —  while 
the  counter-forces  are  melting  away.  The  greatest  retarding 
forces,  the  national  traditions,  political,  religious,  and  social, 
are  already  comparatively  lifeless.  The  revolution  is  beating 
out  of  them  what  vitality  remained.  The  national  character 
is  that  of  a  youth,  the  character  of  the  individual  peasant  that  of 
a  child.  Both  absorb  readily  every  new  and  useful  idea.  The 
peasant  is  somewhat  inert  because  he  is  physically  and  spiri- 
tually underfed.     He  grasps  and  devours  a  friendly  book  or 


2IO  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

newspaper  with  as  much  avidity  as  a  loaf  of  tinaccustomed 
wheat  fioiir.  With  the  same  appreciation  of  his  needs  he  adopts 
and  learns  the  use  of  modem  agricultural  implements  and 
every  modem  method,  when  they  happen  to  fall  within  his 
miserable  means.  The  ignorance  and  poverty  of  the  peasant 
do  not  constitute  a  national  tradition,  despite  the  doctrine  of 
Pobiedonostzev.  The  peasants  are  as  eager  to  improve  their 
condition,  spiritual  and  material,  as  are  any  poor  and  ignorant 
pioneers.  Their  inertia  is  only  a  resisting  medium;  it  is  not  a 
reactionary  force.  It  can  delay  the  time  of  the  final  outbreak, 
and  increase  its  intensity  and  profundity  in  proportion  to  the 
delay.  To  overcome  this  ignorance  and  poverty  of  the  peasants 
there  are  present,  on  a  greater  or  lesser  scale,  all  the  forces  of 
modern  civilisation,  and  a  public  spirit  new  in  the  history  of 
the  great  nations. 

The  material  development  is  backward  only  in  the  coimtry 
and  in  the  less  accessible  sections.  Very  many  of  the  factories, 
mills,  railroads,  and  steamships  are  most  modem ;  so  are  many  of 
the  public  buildings,  theatres,  many  of  the  public  institutions 
and  schools,  and  nearly  all  the  ideas,  aspirations  and  theories 
of  the  truly  educated  class.  No  educated  class  in  the  world's 
history  has  ever  made  such  a  general,  persistent,  and  heroic 
effort  to  reach  the  people.  A  considerable  proportion  of  the 
Russian  peasants,  and  the  larger  part  of  the  Russian  working- 
men,  have  been  familiarised  with  the  most  important  movements 
and  ideas  of  foreign  lands  by  means  of  a  sea  of  forbidden,  and 
therefore  all  the  more  valued,  poptilar  literature.  From  the 
agrarian  movements  of  Europe  to  our  People's  Party,  and 
from  the  conservative  trades  unions  of  Great  Britain  to  the 
revolutionary  socialism  of  the  continent,  there  is  no  great 
movement  or  social  idea  that  has  not  been  in  this  way  brought 
to  the  people.  I  do  not  believe  that  there  is  anywhere  any 
such  deep  and  varied  study  of  all  that  goes  to  make  up  modem 
Socialism  as  among  the  Russian  working  class. 

The  Russian  upheaval  is,  then,  a  conscious  social  movement, 
and  this  is  why  it  may  develop  into  the  most  portentous  historic 
event  up  to  the  present  time.  Like  former  revolutions  and 
civil  wars  in  France,  England,  and  the  United  States,  it  claims 
for  the  citizens  the  political  rights  of  men      But  unlike  any 


THE  PEASANT   GIVES   HIS   ORDERS  211 

preceding  national  cataclysm,  it  insists  on  social  as  well  as 
political  rights,  on  economic  equality,  on  the  right  of  every 
man  to  as  much  land  as  he  can  till,  and  of  no  man  to  more,  and 
on  the  right  of  all  the  people  to  all  the  land  for  all  time. 

The  first  Duma  was  dissolved,  not  on  account  of  the  revolu- 
tionary political  measures  or  the  radical  social  reforms  of  the 
Constitutional  Democratic  majority,  but  because  the  peasant 
deputies  were  making  ominous  preparations  for  social  revolu- 
tion. The  Labour  Group  proposed,  not  the  expropriation  of 
some,  but  the  abolition  of  all  landlords,  along  with  their  depen- 
dents the  tenants  and  agricultural  labourers;  not  the  temporary 
suspension  of  the  sacred  right  of  private  property  in  the  time 
of  a  great  social  crisis,  but  its  abolition  for  all  time.  They 
claimed  it  was  the  duty  of  society  to  provide  work  for  all  the 
people.  Therefore,  they  proposed  to  provide  every  peasant 
labourer  with  all  the  land  he  could  work  with  his  own  hands, 
or  to  come  as  near  that  standard,  "the  labour  norm,"  as  condi- 
tions would  allow. 

There  seems  not  to  be  enough  land  in  Russia  to  keep  every 
tiller  of  the  soil  fully  employed.  But  it  is  just  for  this  reason 
that  the  land  question  has  become  a  social  problem.  If  there 
were  enough  land,  each  individual  could  be  provided  with  his 
quarter  section  and  left  to  fight  it  out  with  nature,  as  in  the 
United  States.  Every  man  would  cultivate  as  much  as  his 
brain  and  body  allowed.  Competition  in  the  marketing  of 
products  there  would  be,  but  not  cut-throat  competition  for  the 
land  itself.  Russian  agriculture  is  facing  already  a  crisis  that 
all  agriculture  will  have  to  face  in  the  end,  when  there  is  no  more 
free  land.  The  nations  then  either  will  have  to  take  the  land 
for  all  the  people,  or  leave  it  a  monopoly  in  the  hands  of  a 
larger  or  smaller  social  class. 

If  Russia's  supply  of  land  is  too  small  now,  argue  the  peasants, 
even  after  the  expropriation  of  all  the  landlords,  why  allow 
every  individual  the  right  further  to  decrease  that  supply  by 
acquiring  a  disproportionate  share?  No  one  man  is  to  own 
an  acre  in  fee  simple,  and  even  his  right  of  possession  is  to  be 
restricted,  not  to  what  he  can  personally  superintend,  as  the 
Constitutional  Democrats  suggest,  but  to  what  he  can  work 
with  his  own  hands  or  in  cooperation  with  fellow  labourers. 


212  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

In  the  words  of  Anikine  in  the  Duma:  "We  need  the  land  not 
for  sale  or  mortgage,  not  for  speculation,  not  to  rent  it  out  and 
get  rich,  but  to  work  on  it.  The  land  interests  us  not  as  a 
merchandise  or  commodity,  but  as  a  means  to  raise  useful 
products.  We  need  the  land  only  to  plough,  therefore  we  do 
not  want  private  property." 

But  if  economic  equality  is  to  be  maintained  there  must  be 
either  equalisation  by  periodic  redistributions,  or  a  progressive 
tax  against  the  more  valuable  properties.  The  peasants' 
group  in  the  Duma  adopted  both  ideas.  If  there  is  a  rapid 
rise  in  land  values,  the  surplus  value  of  those  benefited  is  forth- 
with to  be  taxed  away  for  the  benefit  of  the  community.  If 
the  rise  is  large,  there  may  also  be  a  redistribution  of  the  land. 
With  a  rise  in  the  cost  of  living  and  a  corresponding  increase 
in  the  size  of  the  "alimentary  norm,"  the  individual  may 
demand  a  larger  share,  and  always  a  landless  worker  may 
claim  his  allotment.  The  problem  of  the  unemployed  is  to  be 
solved  by  every  labourer  having  the  right  to  a  farm  —  however 
small. 

As  the  maximum  and  minimum  land  allotment  the  peasants 
propose  to  establish  are  the  same  —  every  man  to  have  as 
much  land  as  he  can  work  with  his  own  hands,  and  no  man 
to  have  more  —  their  goal  is  nothing  less  that  a  practical 
economic  equality.  Some  margin  is  allowed  for  variations 
of  exceptional  individuals  from  the  average  in  their  capacity 
for  labour,  but  the  margin  is  not  very  wide.  Numerous  reso- 
lutions of  peasant  meetings  give  an  accurate  numerical  measure. 
The  peasants  of  the  poorer  lands  wotdd  allow  a  man  to  hold 
from  fifty-six  to  one  hundred  and  thirty -two  acres,  those  of 
more  fertile  districts  from  twenty-four  to  sixty-six  acres,  con- 
sidering that  the  best  worker  in  good  health  can  scarcely  do 
three  times  the  work  of  his  neighbour.  This  is  almost  equality. 
Certainly  it  is  the  recognition  of  the  principle  that  no  man 
should  enjoy  the  fruits  of  another's  labour. 

The  hundred  million  know  very  well  they  are  asking  for 
no  simple  social  reform,  but  for  a  social  revolution  and-  the 
mastery  of  their  country.  They  knew  that  they  were  not  likely 
to  see  their  strivings  of  half  a  century  satisfied  by  a  Duma  in 
the  full  power  of  the  Czar.     The  instructions,  "ukases,"  they 


THE  PEASANT  GIVES   HIS   ORDERS  213 

sent  to  their  deputies  by  the  tens  of  thousands  were  filled  with 
a  sense  of  the  probable  bitterness  of  the  coming  conflict.  "  Fight 
on  you  fighters,"  run  the  exact  words  of  one  of  these.  "Fight 
to  the  bitter  end.  Go  forward  fearlessly  for  the  people's  cause. 
Many  millions  of  dead-worn  and  tormented  peasants  look  to 
you  and  wait.  As  long  as  you  are  with  us  we  will  stand  by 
you."  The  deputies  obeyed.  In  the  Duma  they  denoimced 
the  Government  and  all  its  works;  when  the  Duma  was  closed 
they  called  the  people  to  armed  rebellion.  They  fought  to 
the  bitter  end  —  prison  and  the  shadow  of  the  scaffold.  And 
the  peasants  kept  their  word  too,  as  far  as  their  power  allowed, 
for  they  frequently  offered  their  lives  and  liberty  to  save  their 
deputies  from  arrest. 

Another  ukase  shows  clearly  the  cry  for  real,  social  equity 
—  not  a  merely  theoretical  or  political,  but  a  genuine,  concrete, 
economic  equality.  "Some  tens  of  thousands  own  the  land  and 
live  in  luxury,"  it  argues,  "while  tens  of  millions  must  go  half 
starved  and  work  for  them  their  whole  life  through.  We  human 
beings  are  all  alike  and  all  brothers.  We  must  enjoy  equally 
the  nature  God  has  created,  and  therefore  we  have  decided  to 
ask  the  Duma  to  confiscate  all  the  land  and  to  have  the  State 
take  charge  of  it  and  to  allow  only  those  to  have  access  to  it 
who  will  till  it  with  their  own  hands.  We  rely  upon  the  depu- 
ties we  have  elected  to  do  all  that  is  possible  to  relieve  us  from 
all  kinds  of  misery  and  from  the  Cossacks.  The  Duma  can 
count  on  our  doing  whatever  will  be  required." 

The  following  ukase  of  a  Samara  village  typifies  thousands: 

We  assembled  here  to  write  to  you  and  after  a  discussion  we  came  to 
the  conclusion  that  the  famine,  the  misery,  and  the  ignorance  of  the 
Russian  people,  the  shameful  war  with  the  Japanese,  the  unheard-of- 
troubles,  the  continuous  insurrections,  come  from  the  fact  that  the  best 
lands  of  our  country  belong  to  gentlemen  proprietors,  to  the  Crown,  to 
the  State,  and  to  the  monasteries.  In  spite  of  ourselves  we  are  forced 
to  rent  these  lands  and  pay  for  them  every  year  thirty  rubles  a  dessiatine 
($5.62  an  acre). 

Until  now  we  have  not  been  allowed  to  think  even  of  our  rights. 
They  confiscated  our  property,  laughed  at  us  as  much  as  they  pleased; 
and  since  the  organisation  of  the  institution  of  the  officials  called  ' '  Zemski 
Natchalniki"  (land  officials),  we  have  fallen  completely  into  the  hands 
of  the  gentlemen  bureaucrats.  We  cannot  take  a  single  step  without 
the  authorisation  of  this  little  despot.     Our  private  and  community 


214  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

affairs,  family  and  property  matters,  must  all  be  submitted  to  their 
sanction.  Some  of  them  often  tell  us  that  they  ought  to  be  to  us  both 
"God  and  the  Czar." 

So  we  fear  that  all  the  ills  of  our  poor  country  come  from  the  fact  that 
we  are  in  the  power  of  a  little  group  of  gentlemen,  rich  people,  and  bureau- 
crats. We  have  had  enough.  We  are  at  the  end  of  our  patience,  and 
we  order  our  delegate  Chuvalov  to  demand  in  the  Duma: 

(i)  The  right  to  send  to  the  Duma  as  our  representatives  men  whom 
we  esteem  and  with  whose  convictions  we  are  familiar.  These  repre- 
sentatives must  have  constitutional  power  They  must  be  selected  by 
a  direct,  universal,  equal,  and  secret  ballot.  [This  is  more  advanced  than 
in  the  United  States,  since  the  votes  that  elect  our  Senators  are  neither 
equal  nor  direct]. 

(2)  The  confiscation  of  State,  Crown,  monastery  and  private  lands 
and  their  transmission  into  the  hands  of  the  whole  people  on  the  condi- 
tion that  every  citizen  may  make  use  of  it  who  works  it  with  his  own 
hands,  with  the  aid  of  his  family,  or  in  co5peration. 

The  other  demands  are  the  repayment  into  the  coffers  of  the 
State  of  all  the  money  the  peasants  have  already  paid  for  their 
lands,  the  replacement  of  customs  duties  and  excises  by  a  pro- 
gressive income  tax,  a  general  amnesty  of  political  prisoners 
and  exiles,  the  abolition  of  the  death  penalty,  the  election  of 
all  local  officials,  compulsory  education,  and  the  carrying  out  of  all 
the  liberties  promised  by  the  Manifesto  of  the  1 7th  of  October. 

Already,  then,  along  with  the  social  ownership  of  the  land, 
Russia's  common  people  are  insisting  on  every  other  line  of 
revolutionary  social  advance:  the  elevation  of  the  sacredness 
of  the  human  individual  to  the  point  of  the  abolition  of  capital 
punishment;  the  gradual  equalisation  of  wealth  through  the 
graduated  income  tax,  and  the  most  democratic  representative 
government  possible,  a  single  sovereign  chamber,  with  full 
legislative,  judicial  and  executive  powers,  to  be  elected  by 
direct  suffrage,  like  the  British  Parliament,  and  by  an 
equal  and  universal  vote.  Each  one  of  these  democratic 
institutions  has  been  now  thoroughly  tried,  but  to  our  eternal 
shame  and  disgrace  none  prevail  in  the  United  States.  The 
Russians  have  passed  us  in  their  political  demands.  They  are 
making  an  heroic  revolutionary  effort  to  reach  a  degree 
of  democracy  and  liberty  that  remains  only  a  pious  aspiration 
among  the  Americans. 

The  men  the  peasants  trust  and  to  whom  they  sent  their 


THE   PEASANT   GIVES   HIS   ORDERS  215 

ukases  and  delegations  are  revolutionists.  They  did  all  it 
was  possible  to  do  in  the  Duma  of  the  Czar.  While  the  Duma 
was  in  session  they  insisted  on  a  peaceful  revolution,  an  imme- 
diate constitutional  assembly.  They  proposed  local  commis- 
sions, elected  by  the  equal  vote  of  the  people,  to  report  to  the 
coming  constitutional  assembly  on  the  question  of  the  land. 
But  they  expected  and  predicted  that  the  Duma  would  be 
dissolved  before  anything  could  be  accomplished.  When  this 
happened  they  turned  to  overt  revolution,  accused  the  Govern- 
ment of  treason,  called  on  the  army  to  mutiny,  on  the  population 
to  disobey  the  officers  of  the  law,  on  the  peasants  to  take  the  land. 

The  peasant  group  are  also  Socialists  —  often  former  mem- 
bers of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  or  Social  Democratic 
parties.  They  are  independent  of  formulated  party  programmes, 
they  are  true  democrats  who  believe  that  the  peasants  them- 
selves will  force  the  country  in  the  direction  of  Socialism. 
The  programme  they  proposed  in  the  Duma  was  not  their 
own,  but  that  already  worked  out  by  the  Peasants*  Union  a 
year  before  and  endorsed  by  thousands  of  villages  in  the  fall. 
With  this  programme  as  a  starting-point,  with  the  aid  of  some 
twenty  thousand  "instructions"  they  received  while  the  Duma 
was  in  session,  and  with  the  advice  of  the  six  hundred  delegates 
the  peasants  sent  to  St.  Petersburg,  they  can  surely  claim  to 
know  what  the  peasants  want. 

The  demand  of  the  Peasants*  Union,  of  the  twenty  thousand 
villages,  and  of  the  Labour  Group  has  swollen  from  the  old 
demand  for  "land  and  freedom'*  to  the  war-cry  of  the  social 
revolution:    "To  the  people  all  the  power  and  all  the  land.'* 

Russia's  desperate  struggle  is  not  a  mere  reaction  against 
hunger  and  the  Czar.  It  is  a  world-event  of  unparalleled 
significance,  a  giant  effort  to  win  for  Russia,  and  perhaps  other 
nations  as  well,  what  no  nation  has  ever  attained  —  unlimited 
democracy  in  government  and  equality  in  possession  of  the  / 
land  —  the  fulfilment  of  the  French  Revolution,  the  limit  of 
purely  democratic  evolution,  the  conquest  of  the  last  of  the 
rights  of  man,  a  fierce  attack  at  the  roots  of  private  property 
and  the  laying  of  foundation  for  a  free  Socialist  state. 

This  is  the  cause  that  Russians  die  for,  the  faith  of  the  revo- 
lution —  "to  the  people  all  the  power  and  all  the  land.*' 


CHAPTER  VII 

HOW  THE  PEASANT  BECAME  A  REVOLUTIONIST 

THERE  was  a  time  when  we  considered  the  Czar  the  god 
of  the  earth  and  the  greatest  of  all  benefactors.  Now, 
the  newspapers  have  opened  the  eyes  of  us  common  people. 
We  see  that  he  is  only  the  richest  of  landlords  and  the  first 
of  all  vampires.  The  blood  that  he  has  dnmk  will  some  day 
flow  from  him  again." 

This  statement  is  typical  of  how  the  peasants  talked  after  the 
Czar  closed  the  first  Duma  and  destroyed  the  faith  of  his  people. 
It  was  spoken  in  a  Volga  village  in  my  presence  before  a  chance 
gathering  of  peasants,  and  I  was  requested  to  write  it  down 
and  send  it  to  America  to  show  what  the  common  people  are 
thinking  about  their  Czar.  The  Russian  State  is  resting  on  a 
sleeping  volcano  of  the  people's  hate.  The  real  revolution 
—  that  of  the  htmdred  million  peasants  —  is  yet  to  come.  When 
it  does  come  the  French  Revolution  will  be  eclipsed.  For  the 
forces  to  be  overthrown  by  the  Russian  people  are  richer,  wiser, 
and  incomparably  better  organised  than  was  the  rotten 
feudalism  of  France. 

*  What  afi^  the  chances  of  an  event  of  this  inconceivable 
magnitude?  At  first  glance  the  outlook  is  dark  enough.  Through- 
out all  Russia  the  townspeople  have  abandoned  themselves 
to  depression  or  despair.  The  middle  classes  staked  every- 
thing on  the  Dumas.  Their  last  cards  were  passive  resistance 
as  to  taxes  and  recruits,  and  the  denunciation  of  foreign 
loans.  Passive  resistance  having  proved  impracticable  against 
active  despotism,  was  definitely  abandoned  by  the  very 
party  by  which  it  was  proposed  The  denunciation  of  foreign 
loans  is  accoimtable  at  the  most  for  a  fall  of  not  more  than  a 
point  or  two  in  the  Russian  funds.  The  Constitutional  Demo- 
crats, partisans  of  those  measures,  managed  to  prevent  the 
general  disintegration  of    their  party,  but  they  have  not  been 

216 


THE   PEASANT    BECOMES    A   REVOLUTIONIST  217 

able  to  prevent  a  wholesale  desertion  from  their  ranks.  In  the 
provincial  capitals  and  country  towns,  where,  like  low  thunder, 
the  voice  of  the  gagged  and  beaten  peasants  is  beginning  to  be 
heard,  there  is  a  restless  seeking  for  new  parties  and  new  means 
of  combat  to  correspond  with  the  magnitude  and  profundity  of 
the  growing  revolt. 

The  workingmen  are  hardly  in  a  better  situation  than  the 
middle  classes  of  the  towns.  The  brilliantly  successful  general 
strike  of  October,  1905,  brought  the  Manifesto,  but  it  seems 
to  have  succeeded  only  because  the  Czar  was  unprepared.  The 
workingmen 's  organisations  were  the  first  to  recognise  the  fact. 
The  next  general  strike  must  also  be  an  insurrection,  the  St. 
Petersburg  council  of  labour  deputies  decided  within  a  few 
days  after  the  strike  had  been  brought  to  a  close.  The  expected 
insurrection  strike  took  place  long  before  the  councils  were 
ready  for  it.  The  barricades  of  Moscow  were  reproduced  at 
a  dozen  other  important  industrial  centres.  But  the  Govern- 
ment was  prepared  this  time  for  both  strikes  and  insurrection. 
Within  a  few  weeks  the  last  of  the  barricades  had  been  swept 
away,  the  leaders  imprisoned  or  shot,  and  the  railroad  men  put 
to  work  under  martial  law  and  the  penalty  of  instant  death 
for  leaving  their  posts. 

This  was  the  last  spasmodic  effort  of  the  rebellious  working- 
men.  Since  the  barricades,  the  masses  of  the  towns  have  been 
vainly  dreaming  of,  or  sometimes  vainly  planning,  another 
insurrection.  This  time  it  was  to  be  an  insurrection  of  soldiers 
and  workmen  —  a  mutiny  strike.  There  were  two  insurmount- 
able obstacles  to  the  new  plan.  The  workmen-soldiers  of  the 
artillery  and  sappers  and  miners  were  ready  to  die  for  the 
cause,  and  did  die  by  hundreds  at  Sveaborg  and  Kronstadt; 
but  the  peasant  soldiers,  in  the  face  of  this  type  of  mimity, 
remained  loyal  to  the  Czar.  The  Railroad  Union  was  ready  to 
strike,  but  they  were  not  ready  to  face  the  military  courts 
unless  the  strike  had  some  chances  of  success.  To  gain  success, 
their  congress  imanimously  decided,  there  must  not  only  be  a  ces- 
sation of  labour,  but  a  tearing  up  of  rails,  blowing  up  of  bridges 
and  the  destruction  of  the  telegraph  lines.  The  Government 
has  declared  a  railway  strike  rebellion,  the  strikers  to  be  instantly 
executed  for  high  treason.    Against  this  official  "state  of  war'* 


2i8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  union  proposed  also  to  declare  war.  But  for  such  a  war 
the  railway  workers  are  not  enough ;  they  must  have  the  support 
of  the  population  along  the  lines.  That  population  must 
be  inflamed  to  the  point  not  only  of  protecting  and  hiding 
the  scattered  and  otherwise  helpless  railway  men,  but  of  aiding 
in  the  work  of  cutting  and  keeping  out  the  Government's  com- 
munications —  an  object  eminently  worth  while  in  one  case, 
but  one  only,  when  the  peasants  themselves  are  in  revolt. 
The  Railroad  Union  decided  to  wait. 

Every  path,  then,  that  the  "legal"  opposition  or  the  illegal 
revolution  has  trod  has  led  finally  to  the  peasants.  Refusal  of 
taxes,  refusal  of  recruits,  refusal  to  shoot  on  the  revolted  work- 
men, destruction  of  the  railway  lines,  all  depend  on  the  peasants. 
And  what  has  been  their  reply?  We  know  what  they  did  in 
the  first  two  Duma  elections;  they  sent  the  most  radical  and 
fearless  deputies  the  Duma  contained,  men  at  the  same  time 
wise  enough  to  lead  the  Duma  even  to  its  dissolution,  and  after 
that  to  the  manifesto  of  "passive"  revolt.  We  know  how  they 
supported  their  members  with  hundreds  of  delegations  and 
some  twenty  thousand  instructions  ^s  to  what  their  servants, 
the  deputies,  were  to  demand.  What  do  they  intend,  now  that 
their  Dumas  are  abolished,  now  that  they  have  lost  the  only 
chance  for  a  free  discussion  of  their  lot  on  a  national  scale  that 
they  have  had  for  the  thousand  years  since  they  left  the  pastoral 
stage  of  man,  now  that  all  other  classes  in  the  nation  have 
cried  out  to  them  to  act? 

What  did  the  peasants  say  when  the  first  Duma  was  closed? 
The  papers  of  the  capital  were  not  allowed  to  discuss  the  subject, 
the  peasants  no  longer  had  Duma  delegates  with  whom  to  lodge 
their  grievances.  But  the  provincial  papers,  caught  in  the 
irresistible  current  of  free  expression  that  prevailed  during  the 
Duma's  session,  were  harder  to  suppress,  and  from  them  we 
see  that  in  thousands  of  villages  peasant  opinion  had  so  gained 
the  upper  hand  over  the  village  clergy  and  police  that  public 
discussion,  even  in  official  village  meetings,  went  on  much  as 
before  the  Duma  was  dissolved.  I  went  to  the  provincial 
capitals  and  smaller  towns,  and  visited  a  number  of  village^,  to 
make  sure  that  these  reports  were  correct.  I  found  the  peasants 
invariably  familiar  with  all  the  larger  aspects  of  the  revolution. 


THE    PEASANT   BECOMES   A   REVOLUTIONIST    219 

I  found  that,  trained  by  centuries  of  oppression  and  defeat, 
and  having  put  little  hope  in  the  late  Duma,  they  were  neither 
surprised  nor  despondent  at  its  dissolution.  Having  long  hated 
the  Government,  they  were  now  beginning  to  hate  the  Czar. 
Having  long  lost  respect  for  the  Government  Church,  they  were 
now  turning  actively  against  it.  Having  put  their  case  in  the 
Duma  and  seeing  it  despised  and  their  elected  deputies  thrown 
into  prison,  they  now  fully  realised  that  they  would  get  from 
the  Government  only  what  they  could  take. 

"When  Gapon  came  with  the  workingmen  and  a  petition  to 
the  Czar,  the  ministers  called  them  rebels,"  said  the  peasant 
I  have  quoted  at  the  beginning  of  this  chapter.  "Then  we 
believed  it.  When  the  Duma  was  meeting,  the  ministers  stood 
against  the  people,  and  we  knew  that  the  ministers  were  our 
enemies.  But  now  that  the  Duma  is  dissolved,  we  see  that  the 
Czar  and  the  ministers  are  the  same.  Now  we  know  that  the 
Czar  is  our  enemy,  too,  and  we  must  upset  the  whole  Govern- 
ment.    And  the  peasants  are  ready  to  do  it  " 

This  statement  of  the  peasant  attitude  is  true.  The  massacre 
of  the  22d  of  January,  1905,  removed  the  last  traces  of  loyalty 
from  the  masses  of  the  workmen  and  the  citizens.  The  brutal 
dissolution  of  the  first  Duma,  and  the  abolition  of  the  second, 
took  away  the  last  illusion  and  the  last  hope  from  the  people 
of  the  soil.  On  the  evening  of  the  2  2d  of  January  a  friend 
visiting  Count  Witte  found  him  prostrate  on  his  couch.  With 
tears  in  his  eyes,  Witte  said  the  last  hope  of  the  nation  had 
been  destroyed,  the  faith  of  the  people  in  the  Czar.  That  was 
true  only  of  the  cities  then.  It  is  true  of  the  country  and  the 
nation  to-day. 

Listen  now  to  the  voice  of  another  village.  A  little  group 
was  explaining  to  me  the  village  opinion,  and  about  them 
gathered  the  whole  village,  old  men  and  young  as  they  came 
home  one  by  one  from  the  fields,  the  women  and  the  children. 
Many  talked  at  the  same  time,  but  the  peasants  know  how  to 
talk  together  —  as  they  have  learned  to  do  in  their  village 
meetings  for  centuries  past.  Out  of  the  whole  clearly  came 
this  common  speech: 

"We  did  hope  the  Duma  would  help  us.  But  now  we  see 
that  it  was  made  for  the  rich  and  not  for  the  poor.      We  were 


220  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

told  from  the  first  that  the  Duma  was  a  fraud  made  to  lead  us 
off  by  the  nose,  and  that 's  all  it  was.  We  heard  about  the 
closing  of  the  Duma  a  few  days  after  it  happened,  but  we  did 
not  hear  the  Czar's  manifesto  about  it  read  in  church.  We 
do  not  go  to  church  any  more  because  when  we  hear  the  pope 
pray  for  the  Government  and  the  Czar,  it  is  just  as  if  some 
one  ttuTied  a  knife  in  otu-  stomachs. 

"We  believed  the  October  Manifesto,  too,  and  in  three  days 
the  Czar  took  it  back.  Now  we  all  see  we  have  nothing  to 
expect.  We  Ve  had  enough  of  carrying  the  landlords  on  our 
backs.  It 's  better  to  die  for  the  right.  If  the  other  villages 
do  anything  we  won't  be  behind." 

"Do  you  believe  in  the  Czar?"  I  asked. 

"We  believed  in  him  once,"  they  answered,  without  a  protest- 
ing voice,  "as  in  God,  but  otu-  eyes  now  are  open.  Now  we 
know  it  is  n't  the  ministers,  but  the  Czar  himself  who  is  to 
blame." 

The  villages  I  have  mentioned  were  on  the  middle  and  lower 
Volga.  Up  toward  the  soiu-ce  of  the  river,  by  the  northern 
woods  that  stretch  up  to  the  arctic  tundra  and  reindeer  land, 
I  visited  another  little  town.  There  the  older  peasants  — 
splendid,  erect,  regular-featured  men  —  were  gathered  together 
in  the  tea-house  to  make  a  business  deal  concerning  the  village 
hay  with  their  friend,  the  agricultural  expert  of  the  Zemstvo, 
who  had  brought  me  with  him.  They,  too,  were  unanimous  in 
their  opinions.  They  would  gladly  boycott  the  taxes  and 
refuse  recruits  if  this  were  possible.  But  a  village  can't  resist 
a  squadron  of  Cossacks,  and  the  taxes,  they  understood  clearly, 
were  for  the  most  part  indirect  and  could  not  be  boycotted. 
They  knew  all  about  the  customs  duties  on  cotton  and  tea, 
and  the  excise  duties  on  petroletun,  alcohol,  sugar  and  vodka, 
that  make  them  pay  two  or  three  prices  for  all  they  buy.  They 
were  clear  as  to  what  they  thought  about  the  Duma.  They 
would  not  bother  about  another  such  as  the  last.  The  next  one 
they  would  turn  into  a  constituent  assembly,  and  for  that  they 
would  lay  down  their  lives.  They  knew  well  enough  what  a 
constituent  assembly  was.  It  is  a  body,  they  said,  that  appoints 
all  the  ministers  and  officials.  It  must  have  all  the  power,  and 
nobody  (not  the  Czar)  is  to  have  a  right  to  interfere  with  its 


THE   PEASANT  BECOMES  A  REVOLUTIONIST     221 

acts.  While  the  older  peasants  were  saying  these  things  the 
younger  peasants  outside  were  singing  as  accompaniment  the 
fiery,  revolutionary  words  of  the  peasants'  "Marseillaise." 

The  last  hope  of  the  Czar,  the  ignorance  and  distmion  of  his 
people,  is  giving  way.  In  Russia  the  tendency  of  all  despotism 
to  keep  the  people  in  darkness  and  to  exploit  their  divided 
state  has  been  exalted  into  a  perfectly  conscious  principle  of 
State,  freely  expressed  by  ministers,  bureaucrats,  and  heads  of 
the  Church.  First,  they  say,  do  not  let  the  individual  know 
what  the  Government  is  about,  and,  second,  if  individuals  do 
manage  to  learn,  they  must  not  be  allowed  any  expression  of 
what  they  think  or  want.  The  peasants  were  not  only  not 
taught  to  read  by  the  Government,  they  were  not  allowed  to 
read.  If  they  had  learned  what  the  Government  was  about 
and  wanted  to  hold  meetings  to  discuss  what  they  had  learned, 
the  village  police  sat  by,  closed  the  meeting  when  they  saw  fit, 
and  arrested  those  whose  speeches  they  did  not  like.  As  to 
meetings  of  several  villages,  they  were  tolerated  under  no  form. 

Since  the  war  the  new  pressure  against  this  system  of  com- 
pulsory ignorance  has  all  but  broken  it  down.  The  police 
are  still  on  duty.  Joint  meetings  of  villages  must  be  held 
secretly  in  the  woods.  Unnumbered  tons  of  pamphlets  and 
newspapers  are  confiscated  and  destroyed.  But  all  the  villages 
have  now  read  more  or  less  of  the  new  deluge  of  newspapers, 
pamphlets,  books,  and  peasants'  weeklies.  The  peasants' 
intellectual  appetite  has  grown  incredibly,  as  I  have  already 
pointed  out.  They  beg  newspapers  from  the  travellers,  they 
send  delegates  to  towns  to  get  the  students'  aid.  They  spend 
the  nights  in  barns  or  woods  listening  to  readings  of  the  French 
Revolution,  or  the  history  of  Russia  as  it  is  not  taught  in  the 
schools.  Invariably  they  begged  reading  matter  from  our 
party,  and  I  was  often  astonished  by  what  they  had  already 
read.  They  pulled  the  most  revolutionary  proclamations  out 
of  their  pockets,  and  asked  intelligent  questions  about  the 
conditions  in  the  United  States. 

In  a  certain  village  I  met  a  typical  case  of  this  development 
of  interest.  A  young  peasant  who  had  been  reading  and 
studying  through  the  long  winter  evenings  for  several  years, 
under  the   guidance   of  a   genial   revolutionist   librarian   that 


222  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

spent  his  summers  nearby,  undertook  to  rouse  the  people  of 
his  village  by  reading  to  them.  Two  winters  before  my  visit 
he  had  found  the  villagers  so  little  interested  that  even  in  the 
dull  isolation  of  the  northern  night,  they  did  not  care  to  hear 
him  read.  The  following  winter  all  was  suddenly  changed; 
they  eagerly  followed  and  fairly  consiimed  every  scrap  of 
printed  matter  he  could  offer;  they  were  specially  delighted 
with  a  little  history  of  Russia,  already  circulated  among  the 
villages  to  the  number  of  half  a  million  copies.  Picture  the 
excitement  of  the  peasants  of  a  village  that  has  slumbered  from 
immemorial  times  when  suddenly  awakened  to  the  dramatic 
story  of  their  own  wrongs,  as  freshly  written  by  a  Socialist 
writer  with  something  of  the  simple  style  and  the  emotional 
genius  of  a  Tolstoi! 

Nearly  all  the  peasants  I  met  during  my  two  thousand  mile 
journey  down  the  Volga  had  read  an  excellent  peasants'  weekly, 
published  in  Kasan.  As  a  type  of  several  others  issued  by  the 
Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  or  the  peasant  group  in  the  Duma 
and  scattered  in  nearly  every  village  in  the  land,  a  summary 
of  its  contents  during  the  Duma  and  since  will  show  the 
character  of  the  peasants'  new  intellectual  diet. 

The  Kasan  Peasants'  News  seemingly  neglected  nothing  that 
the  peasants  most  needed  to  understand.  Beginning  with  the 
late  war,  the  whole  ruinous  policy  of  the  Government  was 
exposed  and  effectually  damned.  The  weapons  by  which  the 
Government  maintains  itself  were  sketched  historically  — 
Cossacks,  "black  hundreds"  and  the  League  of  True  Russian 
Men.  It  was  pointed  out  that  the  village  police  and  the 
new  type  of  soldier-ruffians  called  rural  guards,  are  paid  twice 
as  much  as  the  village  schoolmaster,  who  gets  one  hundred 
dollars  a  year.  The  Government's  proposed  reforms  were  laid 
bare  in  all  their  flimsiness,  and  there  was  a  r^sum^  showing  how 
little  the  Government  has  done  for  the  peasants. 

The  possibility  of  change  was  suggested  by  outlines  of  foreign 
forms  of  government,  foreign  election  laws  and  foreign 
agrarian  movements.  There  was  a  full  account  of  the  now 
illegal  Peasants'  Union,  of  the  thousands  of  ukases  sent  by  the 
peasants  to  the  Duma,  of  the  agrarian  disorders,  of  the  brutal 
expeditions  of  revenge  sent  out  by  the  Government  at  the 


THE    PEASANT   BECOMES   A   REVOLUTIONIST     223 

demand  and  often  under  the  personal  direction  of  the  injured 
landlords,  of  the  killing  and  maiming  of  the  peasants,  of  the 
retaliation  of  the  latter  in  the  Baltic  provinces  and  in  the 
Caucasus.  To  combat  the  Government's  efforts  to  turn  the 
popular  excitement  from  itself  to  the  Jews,  Poles,  Armenians, 
Letts,  Lithuanians,  this  peasants'  paper  tried  in  every  number 
to  familiarise  the  peasants  with  the  virtues  and  friendliness 
of  these  "conquered  peoples." 

The  "black"  papers,  sustained  by  Government  subsidies, 
or  by  the  liberal  subscriptions  of  high-place  bureaucrats, 
generals,  and  landlords,  carefully  excluded  any  mention  of  these 
wholesome  truths.  But  their  influence  was  slight.  Only  in 
one  village  did  I  find  copies  of  any  of  the  reactionary  organs 
sent  gratis  all  over  the  land.  For  they  were  not  only  incredibly 
brutal  and  false,  they  were  incredibly  stupid  in  their  judgment 
of  the  peasants.  For  instance,  starving  countrymen  —  and, 
be  it  remembered,  there  were  thirty  million  of  them  in  the  winter 
of  1 906-7  —  were  told  that  the  reports  of  the  famine  were 
grossly  exaggerated,  and  that  if  they  stiff ered  it  was  from  their 
own  drunkenness  and  laziness. 

"Without  the  land  officials  and  police  and  other  benefactors," 
says  one  of  those  extraordinary  articles,  "the  peasants  would 
perish  like  a  flock  without  shepherds."  Now  the  hatred  of 
the  peasants  for  these  same  officials  and  police  is  too  bitter  and 
deep  for  words.  Innumerable  cases  are  on  record  in  which 
these  "shepherds"  have  beaten  their  sheep  to  death  with  clubs, 
or  have  crippled  them  for  Hfe.  In  Tambov,  in  the  fall  of  1905, 
some  half  hundred  peasant  rioters  were  captured  while  engaged 
in  openly  hauHng  off  the  landlords'  grain,  as  the  peasants  did 
in  thousands  of  villages  at  this  time.  The  police  "shepherd" 
had  them  bound  and  gagged,  and  held  them  prisoners  in  the 
bam  which  they  were  sacking.  They  were  made  to  lie  on  one 
side  for  several  weeks  and  beaten  when  they  turned.  One  at 
a  time  they  were  "examined"  and  tortured  within  hearing 
of  their  comrades.  Sixteen  were  thus  before  all  slowly  beaten 
to  death,  executed,  not  for  murder,  violence,  or  attack  on  the 
public  officials,  but  for  taking  in  broad  daylight,  or  stealings  if 
you  like,  what  they  considered  should  in  law  and  justice  have 
been  their  own.     Every  village  has  seen  or  known  of  cases  of  the 


224  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

kind.  What  influence  can  a  press  have  that  sees  in  these 
brutes  the  shepherds  of  the  peasant  flock? 

If  it  were  not  for  the  assiduity  of  a  part  of  the  village  priests 
the  peasants  would  long  ago  have  lost  all  credence  in  the  official 
system  of  falsehood.  One  priest  and  patriotic  agitator  travels 
about  calling  the  peasants*  deputies  in  the  Duma  Anti-Christs 
who  had  been  bought  by  the  Jews.  Others  preach  the  like 
in  their  churches;  all  are  perforce  tools  of  the  Czar,  must  read 
his  ukases  and  manifestoes  from  the  pulpit.  Not  all,  however, 
are  still  "black"  in  their  hearts;  thousands  are  openly  liberal 
and  some  are  secretly  revolutionists.  Those  who  are  still 
loyal  are  being  reduced  by  the  population  to  narrow  straits. 
Only  a  dozen  families  of  the  hundreds  in  the  village,  the  money- 
lenders and  shopkeepers,  are  contented.  The  discontented, 
when  not  rebels  at  heart,  are  incredulous;  in  many  places  they 
have  deserted  the  churches;  in  others  they  are  beginning  to 
boycott  the  services  of  the  priests,  and  in  some  cases  the  villagers 
are  taking  away  from  the  priests  the  grants  of  village  lands  upon 
which  they  live.  The  village  popes  were  never  respected,  and 
this  lack  of  respect  is  turning  into  open  hate.  Their  sermons, 
threats,  and  advice  will  not  long  seriously  hinder  the  new  flood 
of  literature  and  public  discussion. 

In  the  last  two  years  and  a  half  there  has  been  more  reading 
and  discussion  in  the  villages  than  took  place  in  the  preceding 
forty-five  years.  The  peasants,  then,  know  the  great  facts 
of  the  situation,  but  they  know  also  what  they  have  yet  to  learn. 
They  have  discussed  everything  in  their  village  meetings,  and 
often  several  villages  have  met  together  in  the  woods.  They 
have  held  frequent  secret  congresses  at  which  dozens,  hundreds, 
and  even  thousands  of  villages  have  been  represented.  They 
have  gone  further  in  some  governments,  where,  with  the  aid 
of  the  revolutionists,  the  whole  countryside  is  organised  in  a 
system  of  secret  committees  —  village,  volost  (township), 
district  (county),  and  government  (state).  All  this  reading, 
discussion,  and  organisation,  however  hampered  and  incomplete, 
is  duly  bearing  fruit. 

The  idea  of  a  peasants'  union  and  a  peasants'  party,  of  the 
absolute  necessity  of  a  common  organization  for  all  Russia, 
has  taken  permanent  root;  also  the  idea  that  the  people's  Duma 


THE    PEASANT   BECOMES   A   REVOLUTIONIST     225 

was  opposed,  thwarted  and  finally  abolished  by  the  Government 
of  the  Czar;  also  the  demand  for  a  Duma  with  all  the  power 
of  a  constituent  assembly;  and,  finally,  the  belief  that  the 
people  should  have  all  the  land  and  that  there  should  be  no 
more  landlords  either  now  or  at  any  future  time. 

The  great  majority  of  the  villages  hold  in  common  the  same 
ideas  as  to  the  means  by  which  the  people  are  to  get  the  power 
and  the  land.  They  and  their  representatives  —  who  had 
long  ago  proposed  passive  resistance,  the  refusal  of  taxes  and 
recruits,  and  the  denunciation  of  the  foreign  loans,  measures 
that  the  Constitutional  Democrats  adopted  only  when  the  Dtuna 
was  dissolved  —  were  also  the  first  to  discover,  as  they  had 
suspected  from  the  outset,  that  these  measures  alone  would 
never  bring  the  Government  to  terms.  Furthermore,  the 
peasants  have  recognised  that  the  measures  of  their  own 
representatives  were  not  at  the  time  practical.  After  the 
dissolution  of  the  first  Duma  the  peasant  deputies  not  only 
declared  the  Government  illegal  and  at  war  with  the  people, 
but  they  declared  all  peaceful  relations  at  an  end.  They  left 
the  accepted  Fabian  tactics  of  revolution  of  the  Peasants* 
Union  and  joined  with  the  Socialist  parties  in  the  proclamation 
of  mutiny  and  armed  insurrection  before  the  army  was  ready  to 
mutiny  or  the  peasants  ready  to  rise. 

Now,  what  has  happened  in  the  tens  of  thousands  of  disaffected 
villages  that  cover  the  land?  They  read  the  proclamation  of 
the  peasants*  group,  and  agreed  heartily  that  the  Government 
was  illegal  and  was  to  be  overturned.  As  for  the  proposal  of 
insurrection,  they  served  it  as  they  did  the  call  to  passive 
resistance  of  the  Constitutional  Democrats;  they  labeled  it 
as  impractical  and  passed  to  the  order  of  the  day  —  the  tried 
and  developed  tactics  of  the  Peasants'  Union. 

Here  is  the  peasants'  programme:  The  Government  evidently 
is  not  yet  to  be  voted  out,  starved  out  or  suddenly  overthrown. 
But  it  can  be  worried  to  death,  it  can  be  gradually  cut  off  from 
its  sources  of  supply,  the  army  can  be  gradually  honeycombed 
with  disaffection,  the  elections  can  serve  as  an  excuse  for 
agitation  and  disorders;  the  landlords,  the  only  economic  class 
supporting  the  Government,  can  be  starved  out,  their  houses 
and  crops  burned  at  night,  and  themselves  literally  driven  from 


326  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  land;  the  life  of  the  village  authorities,  officials,  clergymen, 
and  police,  can  be  made  unbearable  —  their  property  and  lives 
forfeited  if  need  be.  Government  property  can  be  pillaged  and 
Government  officials  killed.  In  cases  of  successful  guerilla 
war,  as  in  the  Caucasus  and  the  Baltic  provinces,  the  guerilla 
bands  can  be  provided  with  food  and  money,  and  at  the  proper 
moment  bridges  and  railroads  can  be  destroyed.  And  the 
forced  service  of  the  peasant  soldiers  against  their  relatives  and 
friends  can  lead  rapidly  to  the  spread  of  mutiny,  till  finally 
the  larger  part  of  the  army  passes  out  of  Government  control. 
That  all  this  can  be  is  proven  by  the  fact  that  it  has  already 
been.  A  general,  simultaneous,  armed  insurrection  may  never 
occur.  But  there  are  many  degrees  of  rebellion  between  this 
and  the  tame  submission  to  such  "legal"  reforms  as  may  be 
granted  by  a  Government  whose  hands  are  red  with  the  people's 
blood. 

Revolution  by  secret  and  guerilla  war  may  be  long  and 
costly  —  it  may  be  proportionately  thorough  and  profound. 
Russia  may  pay  a  price  such  as  Germany  paid  in  the  Thirty 
Years*  War  —  she  has  not  yet  made  a  tithe  of  the  sacrifices 
we  suffered  for  an  alien  race  during  our  War  of  the  Rebellion. 
But  the  facts  are  already  here  to  show  that,  unfrightened  by 
the  Czar's  access  to  all  the  gold  of  earth,  Russia  is  treading 
with  increasing  rapidity  the  road  of  decentralised,  general,  and 
revolutionary  violence  against  her  Government,  and  that  she 
will  follow  it  to  the  end. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  VILLAGE  AGAINST  THE  CZAR A  STATE  OF  MIND 

THE  threat  and  the  imminent  possibiUty  of  a  costly,  bloody 
and  terrible  revolution  of  the  whole  mass  of  the  people 
is  the  driving  force  in  Russia  to-day.  A  general  uprising  is 
in  the  last  resort  the  only  possible  goal  for  the  revolutionary 
parties,  it  being  deliberately  prepared  for  by  the  Government, 
and  it  is  the  only  real  argument  with  which  the  nation  has 
ever  influenced  the  Czar.  Whether  the  uprising  actually  does 
occur  this  year,  next  year,  or  never  is  relatively  unimportant. 
It  is  enough  to  shape  Russian  history  that  it  is  an  imminent 
possibility.  To  understand  the  chances  of  the  revolution,  the 
motives  of  the  revolutionists,  the  inner  meaning  of  the  policy 
of  the  Government,  we  must  realise  with  all  well-informed 
Russians  that  this  mass  movement  is,  under  present  conditions, 
just  what  may  be  expected  to  occur;  we  must  see  just  what  the 
Government  is  doing  and  may  be  expected  to  do  to  prevent  it, 
and  we  must  know  what  qualities  in  the  people  and  what 
elements  in  the  general  situation  give  the  revolutionists  the 
remarkable  faith  in  the  people  that  inspires  their  action. 

The  Government  is  in  a  feverish  strain  to  keep  the  peasants 
out  of  the  revolution.  This  is  the  key  to  every  action  it  has 
taken  since  Witte  came  into  power.  I  myself  have  heard 
Count  Witte  say,  as  I  have  already  mentioned,  that  he  expected 
the  first  Duma  —  largely  a  peasant  body  —  to  be  composed 
of  Jew-haters ;  that  is,  he  actually  thought  (or  said  he  thought) 
that  the  peasants  would  send  forward  extreme  reactionaries 
in  answer  to  the  call  of  the  Czar.  In  this  mistaken  belief  lies 
the  reason  for  the  original  convocation  of  a  body  that  proved 
to  be  so  hostile  to  the  Czar.  A  majority  of  reactionary 
peasants  was  expected  by  the  Government,  and  this  majority 
was  to  have  offset  the  revolutionism  of  the  zemstvos,  the 
intelligent    townspeople    and    the    workingmen.     But    instead 

327 


228  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

of  sending  reactionary  representatives,  the  peasants  sent 
Aladdin  and  his  confreres,  and  these  men  called  on  the 
peasants,  when  the  Duma  was  dissolved,  to  revolt  against 
a  Government  that  had  "betrayed"  them,  was  guilty  of 
*' treason,"  and  had  forfeited  all  claims  to  authority  and  the 
obedience  of  the  people. 

Not  only  the  institution  of  a  representative  assembly,  but  all 
the  other  real  Government  changes  in  Russia  since  the  fall 
of  1905,  along  with  innumerable  false  promises  of  changes,  have 
been  aimed  at  the  growing  peasant  discontent.  Take  for 
instance  the  new  so-called  "freedom  of  worship."  Immediately 
after  the  October  Manifesto  the  popular  faction  of  the  Russian 
Church,  the  ritualists,  or  "  old  believers,"  were  given  religious 
freedom,  while  the  Jewish  and  other  religions  remained  in  about 
the  same  position  as  before.  Why  were  the  "old  believers" 
preferred?  Because  among  them  are  fifteen  to  twenty  million 
peasants.  Then  consider  the  only  important  change  in  the 
system  of  taxation.  Witte  had  not  been  prime  minister  for 
many  weeks  before  the  peasants  were  relieved  of  thirty-five 
million  rubles  of  direct  taxation  on  the  land  —  and  in  1 906  a 
similar  burden  was  removed.  To  counterbalance  this  loss 
all  other  forms  of  taxation  were  increased.  Then  shortly  before 
the  closing  of  the  first  Duma  came  the  sale  of  the  Crown  lands 
—  a  drop  in  the  bucket  for  the  individual  peasants  —  but  a 
very  real  loss  to  the  Czar.  Then  a  few  months  ago  certain 
special  legal  disabilities  of  the  peasants  were  removed.  They 
Were  given,  for  the  first  time,  freedom  to  come  and  go,  and  access 
to  the  same  justice  (?)  as  the  higher  classes.  Finally  the  property 
disqualification  —  the  inability  of  the  peasants  to  sell  or  mort- 
gage their  share  of  the  village  land  —  has  been  abolished,  and 
it  is  said  that  the  village  commune,  along  with  its  common 
responsibility  to  the  Government  for  the  taxes  of  individuals, 
must  disappear. 

All  these  concessions  were  made  during  or  after  the  time  of 
hundreds  and  thousands  of  armed  peasant  revolts.  And  what  is 
the  outcome?  The  peasants  feel  that  they  have  forced  the 
Government  to  terms.  They  are  not  grateful  as  they  would 
have  been  had  the  changes  been  freely  granted.  They  are  only 
crying  for  more.     For,  of  course,  none  of  these  reforms  strike 


A   STATE   OF   MIND  229 

at  the  roots  of  the  evil  —  the  peasants'  poverty,  the  terrible 
indirect  taxation  on  which  the  Government  lives,  the  oppres- 
sion by  local  officials,  the  lack  of  the  least  trace  of  individual 
freedom,  and  the  lack  of  that  public  life  which  can  only  come 
from  local  and  national  self-government.  Besides,  most 
of  the  reforms  that  have  been  given  are  not  in  reality  in  force. 
Every  vestige  of  new  or  old  freedom  or  legal  form  is  choked  by 
a  monstrous  growth  of  miUtary  courts,  military  governors, 
poHtical  execution  and  exile  without  trace  of  legal  procedure. 
And  every  reality  has  been  diluted  and  adulterated  by  a  mass 
of  false  and  broken  promises. 

The  Russian  peasantry  has  always  been  an  eminently  rebel- 
lious people  and  the  tradition  of  rebellion  has  been  revered 
and  kept  alive  for  hundreds  of  years.  Over  two  centuries  ago, 
almost  immediately  after  the  institution  of  serfdom,  occurred  the 
revolt  of  the  Volga  pirate,  Stenka  Razin,  in  which  millions  of 
peasants  took  part.  More  than  a  hundred  years  ago  half  of 
peasant  Russia  was  infected  with  the  rebellion  of  the  serfs 
against  the  masters  under  the  pretender  Pougatchev.  In  this 
rebellion  hundreds  of  thousands  of  peasants  died,  apparently 
in  vain,  for  freedom.  But  neither  the  authorities  nor  the 
peasants  have  ever  forgotten  the  event.  I  passed  through 
a  Volga  province  last  simimer,  where  the  peasants  of  a  certain 
village  had  asked  the  priest  to  say  a  mass  for  the  souls  of  Pougat- 
chev and  Stenka  Razin. 

All  through  the  present  century  every  province  of  Russia 
has  witnessed  the  horribly  bloody  suppression  of  peasant  revolts. 
In  1854  and  1855  the  rebellions  covered  a  large  part  of  Russia, 
and  the  partly  enlightened  Alexander  II.  told  his  landlords 
that  they  must  either  consent  to  the  proposed  emancipation 
of  the  serfs  or  see  it  accomplished  by  a  movement  from  below. 
Even  this  Czar,  so  autocratic  in  the  last  half  of  his  reign,  realised 
the  power  and  probable  will  of  the  peasants  in  extremis  to  over- 
turn the  whole  structure  of  the  Russian  State.  The  great 
emancipation,  then,  was  accomplished  neither  from  philan- 
thropic motives  nor  from  economic  consideration,  but  from  a 
highly  justified  fear  of  immediate  revolution. 

After  the  emancipation  the  peasants  again  showed  their  unwil- 
lingness to  accept,  unless  through  sheer  impotence,  either  autoc- 


230  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

racy  or  the  well-disguised  shadow  of  reform  that  the  emanci- 
pation turned  out  to  be.  After  passing  through  the  hands 
of  the  landlords'  commission  to  which  the  Czar  referred  it,  the 
proclamation  contained  neither  freedom  nor  even  the  more 
needed  land.  The  State  simply  became  the  master  and  extor- 
tioner instead  of  the  landlord,  while  the  latter  got  an  even 
firmer  grip  on  all  the  better  parts  of  the  land.  The  following 
years  were  most  busy  ones  for  the  Czar's  Cossacks  and  dragoons. 
The  peasantry  of  whole  provinces  were  in  rebellion,  there  was 
violence  in  every  direction,  and  there  were  many  hundreds 
of  outbreaks  sufficiently  serious  to  justify  the  call  for  military 
aid. 

Never  since  the  emancipation  has  the  ceaseless  recurrence 
of  village  rebellions  been  interrupted.  Five  years  ago,  before  the 
Japanese  war,  there  were  half  a  hundred  revolts  in  two  provinces 
alone,  and  the  peasants  had  to  be  mercilessly  beaten  and  executed 
into  submission.  And  in  1906  the  spirit  and  fact  of  rebellion 
became  general  throughout  the  nation  —  more  general,  perhaps, 
than  ever  in  the  history  of  the  empire. 

The  Russian  villages  have  never  lacked  the  will  or  the  courage 
to  revolt.  They  have  only  been  wanting  in  the  physical  possi- 
bility of  revolting  together.  No  army  can  act  as  a  unit,  divided 
into  a  hundred  thousand  contingents  and  scattered  over  the 
half  of  a  hemisphere.  Yet  if  not  much  more  coordinated  and 
organised  now  than  before,  the  revolts  have  become  more  and 
more  general,  and  more  and  more  imbued  with  a  common  idea. 
The  villages  discuss  for  months  and  years  a  situation  that  is 
general  in  the  land.  National  crises  arise.  The  reaction  on 
the  villages  is  general,  almost  universal  —  all  the  villages  are 
prepared  for  similar  action  by  the  same  events.  Some  village 
makes  a  desperate  beginning  and  the  outbreaks  spread  like 
wildfire  over  the  country.  To  the  outsider  it  all  looks  blind 
and  wild.  The  observer  in  the  village  is  neither  shocked  nor 
surprised.  So  it  has  come  about  that  the  spirit  and  manner  of 
the  peasants'  revolts  have  kept  a  general  character  and  have 
evolved  together  as  a  single  movement. 

The  first  roots  of  revolution  go  down  to  the  very  sources  of  the 
peasant  nature.  The  Russian  peasant  was  originally  enslaved 
only   by   the   utmost   cruelty   and  bloodshed,   after    centuries 


A   STATE   OF   MIND  231 

of  the  same  relative  freedom  as  otir  Anglo-Saxon  forefathers 
enjoyed  before  the  Normans  came.  But  the  enslavement  came 
a  thousand  years  ago  in  England;  in  Russia  it  came  but  three 
centuries  ago  —  ten  or  twelve  uneventful  generations  —  and 
the  peasants  never  forgot  their  former  relative  freedom.  The 
Russians  were  so  little  serfs  in  spirit  that  they  attached  the 
smallest  importance  to  their  emancipation  in  i86i  from  a  yoke 
they  had  never  accepted  in  their  hearts.  The  system  had  only 
succeeded  in  keeping  alive  the  spirit  of  rebellion  against  all 
authority. 

The  State  reUgion,  as  we  have  also  seen,  had  no  deeper  hold. 
No  people  of  Europe  so  thoroughly  paganised  the  early 
Christianity  with  their  own  popular  legends  and  their  own 
truly  popular  saints.  Many  millions  of  peasants,  separating 
entirely  from  the  Russian  Church,  have  formed  some  of  the 
most  rational  and  some  of  the  most  spiritual  sects  in  existence, 
never  halted  in  their  growth  by  the  continuous  persecution  of 
the  Government.  As  to  the  rest,  the  so-called  orthodox,  they 
mechanically  follow  the  set  Governmental  forms  and  are  inspired 
with  a  sincere,  if  broad  and  loose,  Christianity.  But  nowhere 
do  they  show  any  deep  respect  either  for  the  priests  or  their 
State-directed  utterances  from  the  pulpit.  Not  in  Catholic 
Italy  or  Protestant  England  is  there  more  resistance  to  the 
Church  as  an  institution,  more  independent  religious  feeling, 
more  rebellion  against  established  creed.  The  peasant  is  imbued 
and  permeated  in  his  religious  feeling,  that  is  in  the  depths  of 
his  nature,  by  a  thorough  spirit  of  revolt. 

In  morality  and  law  the  opinion  of  the  village,  and  not  that 
of  the  priests,  fixes  the  living  moral  code.  This  code  is  vital 
and  flexible,  irregular  and  changeable,  but  on  the  whole  most 
elevated  and  most  humane  —  witness  any  great  Russian  writer, 
say  Turgeniev  or  Tolstoi.  As  for  the  St.  Petersburg  law,  true, 
it  must  be  obeyed,  for  it  is  backed  by  whips  and  bullets,  imprison- 
ment and  exile  —  but  it  comes  from  outside  the  village  assembly, 
so  it  is  obeye4  only  in  its  letter,  and  not  in  its  spirit.  The 
peasants  are  told  by  the  Government  not  to  try  to  understand 
it,  but  to  obey.  So  they  obey  its  letter  without  trying  to 
understand  its  spirit,  and  in  consequence  fully  half  of  the 
Czar's  orders  are  reduced  to  naught. 


232  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  peasants  are  born  and  bred  in  an  atmosphere  of 
unconscious  and  even  conscious  passive  resistance  to  both 
Church  and  State.  They  were  ordered  from  St.  Petersburg 
not  to  interfere  in  the  passing  of  property  from  father  to  son. 
But  the  villagers  have  always  been  accustomed  to  consider  all 
the  land  at  the  bottom  common  property  of  the  village.  When 
an  heir  had  too  little,  he  was  given  something  from  the  village 
store;  when  he  had  too  much,  something  was  taken  away. 
So  the  Czar's  orders  were  disobeyed.  His  terrible  Cossacks 
were  as  nothing  against  the  quiet  village  will,  the  common  and 
almost  religious  feeling  of  the  people  that  the  land  belongs  to 
the  community.  The  majority  of  the  villagers  not  only 
equalised  the  shares  between  heirs,  but  they  equalised  landed 
wealth  among  all  the  families  of  the  village.  The  Czar's 
Government,  seeing  at  every  point  in  the  present  revolution  the 
danger  of  this  rebellious  village  spirit,  has  decided  to  abolish 
entirely  the  commune's  control  over  individual  property.  It 
can  be  doubted  if  the  Czar  has  the  power.  In  the  village,  the 
village  meeting  is  the  sovereign  rather  than  the  Czar. 

Before  the  first  Duma  met,  before  even  the  Peasants'  Union 
had  conceived  the  plan,  the  peasants'  spirit  of  resistance  had 
already  led  to  boycotting  taxes  and  recruits.  Many  villages 
had  refused  taxes  on  various  grounds ;  many  others  had  refused 
the  last  leTies  of  recruits  during  the  war.  These  methods  of 
action  were  proposed  a  year  before  the  Duma  by  peasants  at 
all  the  congresses  of  the  Peasants'  Union  and  were  adopted  and 
spread  broadcast  over  the  land.  When  the  Czar  dissolved  the 
first  Duma,  and  the  representatives  of  all  the  nation  wished  to 
find  a  means  of  general  national  resistance,  they  adopted  as  a 
national  measure  the  peasants'  plan  of  the  boycotting  of  taxes 
and  recruits.  Thus  the  first  great  revolutionary  measure  ever 
endorsed  by  the  Russian  people  as  a  nation,  came  neither  from 
professional  revolutionists  nor  any  upper  social  class,  but  from 
the  people  themselves. 

But  long  before  the  Duma  had  adopted  this  measure,  it 
had  already  been  sufficiently  tested  among  the  peasantry  to 
be  rejected  by  them  as  impractical,  for  it  left  every  advantage 
in  the  hands  of  the  Government,  which,  of  course,  did  not 
scruple  to  use  force.     They  had  turned  to  less  passive  ways 


A   STATE   OF   MIND  233 

of  making  their  power  felt.  The  first  and  most  natural  action 
was  against  the  landlords,  who  constitute  the  main  support 
of  the  throne  both  in  St.  Petersburg  and  in  the  country.  As 
soon  as  the  Czar  had  granted  the  October  Manifesto,  the 
peasants  began  to  make  their  preparations.  They  argued  that 
the  Manifesto  must  have  given  something  of  a  very  concrete 
nature  to  the  nation  at  large,  as  was  evident  to  them  by  the 
enthusiasm  with  which  it  had  been  received  in  the  towns. 
They  knew  that  the  only  reality  to  them  as  country  people 
was  the  land.  Therefore  the  Manifesto  must  sooner  or  later 
enable  them  to  acquire  the  landlords'  landed  property.  They 
began  to  consider  themselves  as  the  future  proprietors  of  the 
landlords'  estates.     The  latter  protested  in  vain. 

Had  the  landlords  not  lived  at  the  people's  expense?  the 
peasants  asked,  and  had  they  not  stood  between  them  and 
the  Czar?  Did  they  have  any  place  in  the  village  religion, 
the  village  morality,  or  the  village  law?  Had  they  not  pillaged 
the  peasants  after  the  emancipation,  and  since  that  time  had 
they  not  taken  advantage  of  the  peasants'  economic  weakness 
and  starvation  to  mercilessly  lower  wages  while  they  pitilessly 
raised  rents?  To  take  a  business  advantage  of  a  starving 
neighbour  may  be  well  in  America;  it  agrees  neither  with  the 
law,  morality,  nor  religion  of  the  benighted  Russian  peasants. 
When  the  landlords  heard  how  the  peasants  reasoned,  they 
began  to  hire  armed  guards.  Evidently,  said  the  peasants, 
they  propose  to  thwart  the  will  of  the  Czar.  The  peasants  would 
see  about  that. 

Suddenly  the  latent  class-hatred  between  the  village  and 
landlord  broke  out  into  a  gigantic  class  war.  The  countryside 
from  Poland  to  the  Urals  and  from  the  Black  Sea  to  the  Baltic 
was  lighted  up  within  a  few  weeks  by  the  fires  of  thousands  of 
country  mansions  —  in  all  some  fifty  million  dollars  of  property 
was  destroyed.  Everywhere  the  movement  was  similar,  since 
it  was  everywhere  invited  by  a  common  situation  and  founded  on 
the  same  peasant  nature.  It  consisted  of  two  procedures. 
First,  the  peasants  moved  as  a  village  against  the  neighbouring 
estate,  often  in  daytime,  always  with  their  horses  and  carts. 
They  took  possession  of  all  the  landlord's  movable  property  — 
implements,  animals,  and  grain  —  and  divided  it  in  more  or  less 


234  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

equal  proportions  among  themselves.  They  usually  claimed 
to  act  either  in  the  name  of  the  people  or  that  of  the  Peasants* 
Union.  The  second  procedure  was  almost  always  the  burning 
of  the  landlord's  house  as  a  war  measure  against  this  common 
enemy  of  the  people,  lest  he  should  return  and  demand 
possession  of  what  he  claimed  as  his  own.  The  landlord  himself 
and  his  servants  were  rarely  attacked.  There  was  little  or 
nothing  of  the  spirit  of  personal  vengeance. 

This  was  the  most  universal  plan  of  action  in  the  months  of 
November  and  December,  1905.  With  the  coming  of  the  winter 
snows,  all  the  most  active  movements  must  relax.  The  peasants 
had  time  to  think  over  this  first  plan  of  revolt,  and  their  cooler 
judgment  was  against  it.  Cossacks  came  to  the  villages  —  not 
to  all  at  once,  there  would  not  have  been  enough  Cossacks  in 
the  Empire  to  do  that  —  but  to  one  at  a  time ;  they  took  back 
the  landlords'  property,  beat  the  peasants  into  submission, 
killed  a  few  of  the  ringleaders,  and  sent  others  to  Siberia  or  the 
prisons  in  the  towns.  The  landlords  got  back  enough  of  their 
live  stock  and  provisions  to  enable  them  to  return.  The  plan 
had  failed  in  every  aspect.  The  peasants  were  neither  on  a 
better  economic  footing,  nor  had  they  achieved  the  least 
measure  of  freedom.  They  had  only  further  embittered  the 
landlords  and  police. 


CHAPTER    IX 

THE  czar's  armies  OF    REVENGE 

Ciphered  Telegram  N  929,  January  5,  1906:  To-day  an  agitator 
has  been  arrested  in  the  Kagarlyk  locality,  government  of  Kiev,  in  the 
estate  of  Ychertkoflf.  The  crowd  demands  with  threats  his  immediate 
liberation.  The  local  armed  force  is  insufficient.  I  therefore  urge  you 
persistently,  in  this  case  as  in  all  similar  ones,  to  order  the  mutineers  to 
be  forthwith  annihilated  by  force  of  arms,  and  in  case  of  resistance  their 
houses  to  be  burned.  At  the  present  moment,  it  is  necessary  to  uproot 
once  and  for  all  the  people's  tendency  to  take  the  law  into  their  own 
hands.  Arrests  do  not  attain  their  purpose  now;  it  is  impossible  to  judge 
hundreds  and  thousands  of  people.  The  sole  thing  necessary  now  is  that 
the  troops  should  be  penetrated  by  the  directions  given  above, 

(Signed)  P.  Durnovo. 

AT  THE  beginning  of  1906  it  was  already  evident  the  Russian 
Crovemment  was  declaring  war  upon  a  large  part  of  the 
Russian  people.  The  measures  proposed  in  this  order  of  the 
minister  of  the  interior  are  not  legal  measures,  nor  even  the 
customary  procedure  of  maitial  law.  This  means  that,  in  the 
course  of  a  few  weeks,  he  had  reached  the  last  stage  of  govern- 
mental violence.  On  November  30,  1905,  Durnovo  had  issued 
another  order  also  directed  against  the  Russian  civil  law,  but 
still  perhaps  not  in  accord  with  a  certain  military  conception  of 
legality.  He  had  addressed  a  circular  to  the  local  agents  of 
the  political  police  as  follows: 

I  request  you  (i)  to  arrest  all  those  revolutionary  ringleaders  and 
agitators  who  have  not  been  arrested  by  the  judicial  authorities  and 
immediately  to  take  steps  to  have  them  confined  under  police  surveillance; 
(2)  not  to  make  any  special  inquiries  in  regard  to  such  cases,  but  merely 
to  draw  up  a  report  stating  briefly  the  causes  of  arrest  and  facts  establish- 
ing guilt;  (3)  if  persons  known  as  agitators  are  liberated  by  the  judicial 
authorities  to  keep  them  under  guard  and  to  proceed  to  act  in  accordance 
with  (2). 

I  had  a  long  interview  with  the  Minister  of  War  Rediger  at 
this  time.     He  did  not  fail  to  distinguish  between  military  law 

235 


236  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

and  levying  war  on  the  population.  "When  a  detachment 
of  soldiers  in  charge  of  an  officer  is  sent  into  a  village  with  an 
order  to  arrest  and  shoot  such  and  such  persons,  or  to  bum  down 
such  and  such  houses,  this  can  be  accomplished  without 
disttu*bing  the  ordinary  functions  and  regulations  of  a  modem 
army.  Even  if  the  officer  is  told  to  shoot  every  tenth  peasant, 
or  to  bum  down  every  tenth  house,  it  is  possible  for  him  to 
execute  this  order.  But  what  is  the  sense  of  issuing  a  command 
to  a  young  officer  to  pacify  a  village  (the  stereotyped  official 
phrase  for,  the  revenge  taken  by  these  military  expeditions)  ? 
There  can  be  no  denying  that  a  considerable  proportion  of  the 
younger  officers  lack  the  character,  education,  and  sense  of 
responsibility  to  be  entrusted  with  such  a  task.  It  could  not  be 
denied  that  many  of  the  young  lieutenants  are  often  heavy 
drinkers.  Stationed  a  few  days  or  a  few  months  in  the  village, 
with  the  power  of  life  and  death  over  all  its  inhabitants,  it  is 
impossible  to  say  what  outrages  they  might  allow  to  be 
committed  in  their  name." 

If  we  remember  not  only  that  many  of  the  younger  officers 
are  drunkards,  as  the  minister  suggested,  but  that  they  are 
themselves  the  very  landlords  or  the  sons  of  the  very  landlords 
that  the  peasants  have  attacked,  we  may  be  prepared  to  expect 
every  possible  cruelty  and  excess.  We  are  not  surprised  at  the 
execution  of  captured  peasants  by  the  dozens  and  hundreds, 
nor  by  the  barbarous  tortures  that  have  been  practised  over 
and  over  again.  I  shall  not  even  try  to  summarise  the  various 
notorious  cases  of  torture,  in  many  of  which  young  girls 
were  the  victims,  that  have  been  proven  to  take  place  in 
the  prisons.  I  shall  not  speak  of  the  execution  soon  after 
torttire  of  many  prisoners  in  order  to  prevent  them  from 
reporting  the  scenes  later  to  the  public.  It  may  interest  the 
reader,  however,  to  show  the  spirit  in  which  this  bloody 
work  was  carried  on,  to  quote  a  well-authenticated  case 
among  inntmierable  others  of  the  beating  of  a  woman  by 
the  order  of  the  notorious  German  Baron  von  Sievers  at 
Fellin  During  the  thrashing  the  woman  did  not  utter  a 
sound  but  afterward  declared  in  a  strong  and  energetic  voice 
to  her  tormentors,  "This  is  against  the  law.  There  is  no 
Russian    law    that    allows   you    to    punish    people  in    such   a 


THE   CZAR'S  ARMIES  OF  REVENGE  237 

manner."  Von  Sievers's  answer  was  an  order  for  her  to  be 
thrashed  a  second  time. 

Already  himdreds  of  thousands  have  been  beaten  and  tens 
of  thousands  executed  under  this  thin  pretence  of  military  law. 
But  when  we  come  to  the  wholesale  beating  of  villages  according 
to  the  first-quoted  order  of  Minister  Durnovo,  we  are  no  longer 
dealing  with  punishment  at  all,  of  however  unjust  and  barbarous 
a  character,  but  with  civil  war,  for  there  is  no  pretence  that  more 
than  a  part  of  the  people  beaten  are  guilty  of  anything  whatever, 
unless  it  be  not  aiding  the  Government  in  its  brutal  revenge. 

Here  is  a  typical  case,  quoted  from  the  letter  of  an  inhabitant 
of  the  village  of  Korovine  in  the  province  of  Smolensk: 

On  the  8th  of  January  a  troop  of  soldiers  was  sent  into  this  village. 
With  the  soldiers  there  arrived  the  captain  of  police,  a  colonel  of  the 
gendarmes,  and  other  officers.  The  "judgment"  (otherwise  called 
pacification)  commenced.  The  mayor  of  the  village  was  called.  "How 
did  you  dare  to  allow  this  brigandage  in  the  village?" 

"What  could  I  do,"  replied  the  mayor. "One  dares  everything  when 
one  is  starving.  But  to  know  which  of  us  took  part  in  this  brigandage 
there  must  be  a  just  trial." 

' '  Take  off  his  clothes  and  take  him  into  the  neighbouring  bam.  There 
they  will  give  you  a  just  trial." 

Four  soldiers,  two  armed  with  guns  and  two  with  rods,  were  sent  into 
the  barn.  The  soldiers  with  guns  stopped  in  front  of  the  gate  and  the 
soldiers  with  rods  went  inside.  .  .  .  The  tribunal  remained  in  the 
village  the  entire  day.  In  Korovine  all  the  peasants  were  beaten; 
nobody  was  spared,  not  even  the  old  men.  No  interrogation  was  made, 
no  inquiry  —  everybody  was  beaten  without  distinction.  An  old  man 
aged  sixty  who  had  received  twenty-five  blows  said  on  rising:  "God 
be  praised  that  they  have  not  beaten  me  to  death."  This  seemed  to 
be  an  insolence  and  the  old  man  received  twenty-five  more  blows. 

These  situations  are  entirely  beyond  the  power  of  an  ordinary 
pen.  I  make  no  attempt  to  picture  them  to  the  reader's  mind. 
Fortimately,  Russia's  writers  of  genius  have  made  such  an 
attempt  unnecessary.  Among  these  none  is  more  devoted 
to  the  peasantry  than  Korolenko,  the  greatest  writer  of  South 
Russia  living  at  the  present  time,  the  author  of  many  stories 
translated  into  every  modem  language,  a  publicist  of  the  first 
importance,  and  chief  editor  of  Russian  Wealth,  perhaps 
the  coimtry's  leading  scientific  and  literary  monthly.  Korolenko 
is  not  merely  devoted  to  the  peasants ;  no  man  in  Russia  has  been 


238  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

more  active  in  their  behalf,  and  therefore  of  course  more  hostile 
to  the  Government.  Like  so  many  of  Russia's  great  men,  he 
has  spent  a  large  part  of  his  life  in  exile. 

I  talked  with  Korolenko  about  the  conditions  in  his  province 
of  Poltava,  and  later  I  paid  a  visit  to  the  very  place  that  caused 
the  writing  of  the  famous  letter  which  I  quote  in  part  below. 
I  interviewed  the  peasants  of  the  villages  where  these  brutalities 
had  occurred,  and  they  substantiated  in  every  respect  Korolenko 's 
facts  and  shared  his  views.  I  talked  also  with  the  liberal 
justice  of  the  peace  who  brought  the  facts  to  Korolenko 's 
attention,  and  he  guaranteed  that  all  was  just  as  Korolenko 
relates.  AH  the  facts  the  letter  contains  are  perfectly  familiar 
to  every  Russian  in  hundreds  and  thousands  of  other  cases; 
but  the  courageous  statement  by  Korolenko  was  the  sensation 
of  the  country  for  many  weeks,  and  the  celebrated  author  is 
still  not  free  from  the  Government  persecutions  that  were  its 
result.  The  reader  will  be  interested  to  know  that  the  brutal 
Filonoff  was  afterward   killed  by  the  revolutionists. 

Korolenko 's  letter: 

Sir  States-Counsel  Filonoff: 

Personally  I  do  not  know  you  at  all.  Neither  do  you  know  me.  But 
you  are  an  official  who  has  come  into  wide  prominence  in  our  province 
for  the  glorious  war  you  have  been  waging  against  your  own  country- 
men. And  I  am  but  a  writer  who  asks  you  to  take  a  retrospective  look 
at  a  brief  record  of  your  deeds. 

In  the  village  Sorochintza  (Poltava  province)  a  number  of  meetings 
have  taken  place.  The  people  of  Sorochintza  evidently  thought  that 
the  Manifesto  of  the  1 7  th  of  October  granted  them  freedom  of  assemblage 
and  speech.  At  those  meetings  speeches  were  made,  resolutions  passed. 
Amongst  other  things  it  was  decided  to  close  the  Government  liquor  stores, 
and  not  waiting  for  an  official  sanction,  they  were  in  compHance  with  the 
decision  closed. 

On  the  1 8th  of  December,  for  no  cause  whatsoever,  a  villager  by  the 
name  of  Besviconny  was  arrested.  The  Sorochintza  people  demanded 
that  he  be  tried  before  a  court,  and  that  meanwhile  he  should  be  let  out 
on  bail.  This  they  were  denied.  Then  the  Sorochintza  people  in  their 
turn  arrested  an  uriadnik  and  a  pristav  (police  officials). 

On  the  19th  of  December,  Assistant  Ispravink  (a  higher  police  official) 
Barabast,  at  the  head  of  a  hundred  Cossacks,  arrived  at  the  village. 
He  was  permitted  to  see  the  arrested  pristav  and  uriadnik.  The  latter 
advised  him  to  release  the  arrested  peasant.  Barabast  promised  to  do 
so.     But  then  he  changed  his  mind  and  decided  to  '"punish"  the  Soro- 


THE     CZAR'S   ARMIES   OF   REVENGE  239 

chintza  people.  He  ordered  the  Cossacks  to  attack  them  —  and  a  terri- 
ble collision  between  the  attacking  Cossacks  and  the  unarmed  peasants 
took  place,  as  a  result  of  which  the  assistant  ispravink  was  mortally 
wounded  and  about  twenty  peasants  killed.  The  Cossacks  were  not 
satisfied  with  dispersing  the  crowd  and  releasing  the  pristav.  They 
chased  the  peasants  and  killed  them  when  overtaken.  This  was  not 
enough ;  they  dashed  into  the  village  and  began  to  hunt  down  every  one 
insight      .     .     . 

So  in  the  house  of  Maisinka  the  watchman  Otrechko  fell  while  peace- 
ably cleaning  the  snow  off  the  steps  of  his  master ;  so  Garkovenko,  feeding 
his  master's  cattle  in  the  court  a  kilometre  away  from  the  mayor's  house; 
a  Cossack  took  aim  at  him  from  the  comer  of  the  street,  Garkovenko, 
wounded,  fell  before  he  had  even  seen  his  assassin.  So  the  old  pharma- 
cist, Fabian  Perevozki,  coming  back  from  the  post-office  with  his  son. 
A  Cossack  shot  the  son  to  death  under  the  eyes  of  the  father  near  the 
Orlov  home.  So  Sergius  Kovchine  was  killed  a  few  metres  away  from 
his  door.  The  wife  of  the  peasant  Mabvestki  was  killed  at  the  same 
door.  A  young  girl  named  Kelepov  had  her  two  cheeks  shot  away.  I 
could  tell  you  with  details  the  conditions  and  the  place  of  all  the  murders 
of  Sorochintza  —  it  is  enough  to  say  that  eight  persons  were  killed  at 
the  mayor's  house  and  nearby,  that  twelve  fell  in  the  street  near  their 
houses  or  in  the  courtyards. 

Now,  Mr.  States-Counsel  Filonoff,  I'll  take  the  liberty  to  ask  you: 
Was  there  committed  in  Sorochintza  on  the  19th  of  December  one  or 
many  crimes?  Do  you  think  that  only  the  blood  of  people  in  uniforms 
is  valuable  and  that  the  blood  of  these  common  people  dressed  in  simple 
peasants'  clothes  can  be  freely  shed  like  water?  Doesn't  it  seem  to  you 
that  if  it  is  necessary  to  investigate  by  whom  and  under  what  circum- 
stances Barabast  was  killed,  that  it  is  not  less  necessary  that  justice 
should  occupy  itself  with  the  investigation  of  the  men  who  with  rifle 
and  sabre  were  butchering  in  the  streets,  yards,  and  orchards  unarmed 
people  who  were  neither  attacking  them,  nor  offering  any  resistance,  and 
who  neither  were  present  at  the  spot  of  the  fatal  collision  nor  even  aware 
that  it  had  taken  place? 

It  is  not  at  all  necessary  for  me  to  apply  to  this  tragedy  the  great  prin- 
ciples of  the  new  fimdamental  laws  (the  October  Manifesto).  For  this 
purpose  any  law  of  any  country  which  has  the  most  rudimentary  concep- 
tion about  written  or  customary  laws  would  be  sufficient.  Just  go,  Mr. 
States-Counsel  Filonoff ,  to  the  land  of  the  half-savage  Kurds,  to  the  home 
of  the  Bashi-Bazouks.  Even  there  any  judge  will  say,  "Even  our  imper- 
fect laws  recognise  that  the  blood  of  people  in  plain  clothes  appeals  to 
justice  just  as  much  as  the  blood  of  a  killed  official." 

Will  you  dare  to  openly  and  publicly  deny  this,  Mr.  States-Counsel 
Filonoff?  Undoubtedly  not!  And,  therefore,  we  both  agree  that  the 
representative  of  the  authorities  and  law  in  going  to  Sorochintza  had  a 
severe,  but  honourable  and  solemn  r61e  to  fulfill. 

In  this  place,  seized  by  confusion,  sorrow,  and  horror,  he  ought  to 


240  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

have  reminded  the  people  of  the  law,  severe  but  impassionate,  just, 
standing  above  all  momentary  emotion  and  passion,  which  severely 
condemns  the  mob's  law,  but  which  also  (note,  Mr.  Filonoff)  does  not 
admit  the  very  idea  about  caste  vengeance  from  the  part  of  officials  on  the 
population     . 

But  to  Sorochintza  there  was  sent,  not  an  investigating  magistrate, 
but  you,  Mr.  States-Counsel  Filonoff,  and  upon  you  falls  the  whole 
responsibility  that  the  military  force  placed  at  your  disposal  turned 
from  guardians  of  the  law  into  lawbreakers  and  outrageous  oppressors. 

You  began  from  the  very  start  to  act  in  Sorochintza  as  if  in  a  conquered 
land.  You  ordered  the  village  assembly  to  be  driven  together  —  and 
declared  that  if  it  would  not  assemble  you  would  destroy  the  whole 
village,  "not  leaving  even  ashes  to  remember  it  by." 

Is  it  then  to  be  wondered  at  that,  after  such  orders  in  such  a  form, 
the  Cossacks  began  to  drive  the  peasants  together  in  their  own  way.  .  .  . 
that  men  were  cruelly  beaten,  women  and  girls  outraged? 

First  of  all  you  ordered  the  people  thus  driven  together  all  to  get  down 
on  their  knees  —  you  forced  them  to  obey  your  order  by  surrounding 
them  with  Cossacks  with  drawn  swords  and  by  placing  opposite  the  crowd 
two  field  guns.  All  submitted  and  got  down  on  their  knees,  their  heads 
uncovered,  in  the  snow.  .  .  .  Under  the  threat  of  death  you  kept 
them  thus  for  four  and  a  half  hours.  You  did  not  even  give  a  thought 
to  this,  that  amongst  these  unlawfully  tortured  people  there  may  have 
been  those  who  had  not  yet  buried  those  innocently  killed  on  the  19th 
of  December,  brothers,  fathers  and  daughters,  before  whom  others  ought  to 
kneel  and  ask  forgiveness  for  killing     . 

This  crowd  of  people  was  necessary  for  you  as  a  background  to  prove 
)rour  Counselman's  Almightiness  and     .     .     .     contempt  for  the  laws. 

The  further  "examination"  consisted  in  that  you  called  out  names 
of  peasants  from  a  list  made  beforehand. 

And  what  did  you  call  them  out  for?  For  examination?  For  estab- 
lishing the  extent  of  their  guilt  and  responsibility? 

As  soon  as  the  person  called  out  opened  his  mouth  to  answer  the 
question  asked  of  him,  to  explain,  maybe  to  prove,  his  utter  innocence, 
you  with  your  own  Counselman's  hands  gave  the  man  full  swinging  blows 
in  the  face,  and  handed  him  over  to  Cossacks  who  by  your  order  continued 
the  criminal  torture  begun  by  yourself,  throwing  him  in  the  snow,  beating 
him  with  nagaikas  on  the  head  and  face  until  the  prey  lost  his  voice, 
consciousness,  and  all  semblance  to  a  man. 

But  all  this  seemed  to  you  not  enough,  and  casting  your  eyes  over  the 
people  who  stood  before  your  Counselman  Majesty,  you  were  inspired 
with  a  new  act  of  refined  cruelty.  You  ordered  the  Jews  to  separate 
from  the  Christians,  put  them  separately  on  their  knees  and  ordered  the 
Cossacks  to  beat  them  without  discrimination.  You  explained  this 
act  of  yours  by  this,  that  the  Jews  are  clever  and  that  they  are  the 
enemies  of  Russia.  The  Cossacks  moved  through  the  kneeling  crowd, 
whipping  right  and  left  men,  children,  and  aged  people.     And  you,  Mr. 


THE    CZAR'S   ARMIES   OF   REVENGE  241 

Counsellor  of  State,  stood  looking  at  their  butchery  and  encouraging  the 
Cossacks  to  greater  cruelties. 

Filonoff's  expedition  of  course  did  not  terminate  in  a  single 
village,  but  covered  a  score.  I  followed  in  his  path  and  found 
that  everywhere  his  actions  had  been  the  same ;  and  I  also  found 
that  the  peasants  rejoiced  at  his  death,  and  were  far  more 
revolutionary  than  before  his  visit.  Filonoff's  expedition  was 
not  an  extreme  case  of  brutality.  According  to  all  that  I  was 
able  to  find  out,  it  was  rather  a  typical  case.  Some  of  the 
officials  were  less  brutal,  but  only  a  few.  Multiply  Filonoff's 
score  of  villages  by  several  hundred,  and  we  have  some  sort 
of  a  picture  of  the  Government's  revenge  among  the  Russian 
peasantry.  Add  to  these  the  far  more  serious  wholesale 
slaughter  and  massacres  among  all  the  non-Russian  races, 
Letts,  Poles,  Armenians,  Georgians  and  others,  and  we  get  a 
general  idea  of  the  full  extent  of  this  chapter  of  the  Government's 
colossal  crimes. 

Some  of  the  worst  of  Stolypine's  wholesale  tortures  while 
governor  of  the  Province  of  Saratov,  were  for  the  purpose  of 
coercing  the  peasants  to  bear  false  witness  against  themselves. 
I  have  a  signed  document,  sworn  to  by  a  whole  village,  as 
testimony  of  this  kind  of  action.  The  action  described  is  only 
one  among  very  many  of  Stolypine's  exploits,  and  Stolypine 
himself  is  only  a  type  of  a  hundred  high  dignitaries  of  the 
Russian  Government  who  have  behaved  in  this  manner  toward 
the  conquered  people.     Here  is  the  document: 

The  i8th  of  November,  1905,  we,  the  undersigned  peasants  of  the 
village  of  Khvalinshine  of  the  district  Sordobsk  of  the  province  of 
Saratov,  having  assisted  at  the  meeting  of  the  village  assembly  to  the 
number  of  2 1 5  persons,  have  discussed  the  question  of  the  arrests  in  our 
commune  made  by  the  order  of  General  Sacharov. 

The  8th  of  November  Mr.  Sacharov  arrived  in  our  village  accompanied 
by  Governor  Stolypine,  by  the  chief  official  of  the  district,  the  chief  of 
the  district  police,  other  functionaries  and  an  escort  of  Cossacks. 

A  village  meeting  was  called  together  before  which  Mr.  Sacharov 
explained  the  end  of  his  visit  and  the  powers  with  which  he  was  furnished 
(practically  all  the  unlimited  powers  of  the  despot  Czar). 

The  president  of  the  village  community  and  the  village  council  wished 
to  speak  for  the  peasants  in  favour  of  sending  to  St.  Petersburg  a  dele- 
gation to  explain  the  peasants'  misery,  but  they  were  immediately  arrested 
and  beaten  till  they  lost  consciousness. 


242  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

After  a  brief  conversation  Mr.  Sacharov  retired  into  the  office  of  the 
village  court,  after  which  Mr.  Governor  Stolypine  called  one  after  another 
the  members  of  our  commune,  submitting  them  to  the  following  questions  : 

"Have  you  pillaged  the  property  of  the  landlord  Beklenichev?  Have 
you  burned  his  house?" 

"No,"  was  the  answer. 

Then  the  Cossacks  commenced  to  beat  with  their  "nagaikas,"  to  strike 
with  their  fists  and  their  bayonets  and  the  flats  of  their  swords,  to  tear 
out  the  hair  and  beards  of  the  wretched  peasants.  Several  were  beaten 
two  or  three  times  to  force  confessions  from  them.  Some,  all  bloody, 
finally  confessed.  All  this  took  place  under  the  eyes  of  the  officials, 
who  gave  the  order  to  redouble  the  rigour  of  the  punishment.  Such  was 
the  manner  in  which  the  thirty-two  men  arrested  were  questioned. 

After  these  savage  punishments  Governor  Stolypine  proposed  to 
the  other  peasants  that  they  should  sign  a  decree,  by  which  the  commune 
declared  that  it  rejected  these  thirty-two  men  from  its  midst  as  dangerous 
individuals.  Indeed,  we  ourselves  signed  this  degree,  for  after  the  terror 
through  which  we  had  passed  we  did  not  have  the  strength  to  refuse. 
All  the  arrested  men  are  now  in  prison. 

As  soon  as  we  became  conscious  of  the  illegality  of  the  administration, 
we  found  that  the  functionaries  who  had  come  to  us  had  acted  on  the 
evidence  of  the  local  police,  of  spies,  and  of  other  cowardly  persons. 
Although  the  property  of  Beklenichev  had  been  sacked,  the  culpability 
of  the  thirty-two  peasants  of  our  commune  had  not  been  established. 
All  the  men  arrested  are  good  people  and  have  never  been  known  to  have 
committed  any  damaging  acts  in  the  village.  They  underwent  their 
punishment  at  the  instigation  of  police  spie"  and  officials.  The  decree 
that  we  signed  on  the  8th  of  November  to  have  these  thirty-two  men 
exiled  to  Siberia,  we  consider  to  be  illegal,  because  it  was  tortured  from 
us  by  violence.  In  consequence,  we  have  decided  to  address  ourselves 
to  the  Council  of  Advocates,  praying  it  to  present  our  decree  to  the  high- 
est administration  in  order  that  it  may  be  annulled,  that  a  new  inquiry 
may  be  ordered  concerning  the  thirty-two  peasants  falsely  convicted 
and  that  the  administrators  who  tolerated  the  savage  punishments 
inflicted  by  the  Cossacks  may  be  cited  before  the  courts.  We  hope  that 
our  request  will  be  heard. 

Needless  to  say,  it  was  not.  But  later,  Sacharov,  who  was 
gtdlty  in  innumerable  cases  of  shedding  innocent  blood,  was 
"executed"  by  the  revolutionists. 
r^  It  will  be  seen  that  the  village  was  by  no  means  converted 
to  loyalty  to  the  Government  by  these  terrible  public  tortures. 
No  man  ever  failed  more  miserably  to  frighten  the  peasantry 
than  Prime  Minister  Stolypine  while  governor  o^  the  province 
of  Saratov.     The  following  instance  is  quoted  and  condensed 


THE    CZAR'S   ARMIES   OF   REVENGE  243 

from  an  account  by  the  popular  poet,  "Tan,"  or  Bogoraz,  one 
of  the  founders  of  the  Peasants'  Union,  a  scientific  writer  on 
ethnology,  a  literary  character  of  the  first  rank  in  Russia,  who 
had  visited  the  village  of  Ivanovka  very  soon  after  the  presence 
there  of  a  "punishment  expedition"  of  Stolypine.  The  cause 
of  this  expedition  was  a  resolution  that  had  been  passed  by  the 
village  assembly  after  having  been  drawn  up  by  a  young 
educated  peasant  of  the  place.  This  yoimg  man,  typical 
of  the  new  village  leaders,  had  educated  himself  at  a  tremendous 
sacrifice  to  become  a  teacher,  but  had  been  thwarted  by  the  offi- 
cials on  accoimt  of  his  liberal  opinions.  Like  all  the  other  resolu- 
tions, this  one  demanded  liberty  of  speech,  press  and  meeting,  a 
constitutional  assembly  elected  by  equal  and  universal  suflPrage, 
and  the  transference  of  the  land  into  the  hands  of  the  people. 

A  few  days  after  the  passage  of  this  xhe  then  Governor  Stoly- 
pine arrived.  "Rebels,  revolutionists,  who  influenced  you 
to  do  this?"  he  shouted. 

"All  the  village,"  he  was  answered. 

"You  lie!     Who  composed  the  resolution?" 

Bitchenkov,  the  young  man,  advanced  and  declared,  "It 
was  I!" 

"You  lie!     Go  and  write!" 

They  took  this  man  Bitchenkov  into  a  neighbouring  room 
and  gave  him  pen  and  paper. 

"Why  do  you  not  write?" 

"Wait,  I  must  think  a  little;  I  am  very  excited." 

"You  lie!     Why  should  you  be  excited?" 

"I  was  never  so  near  such  a  great  person  as  you." 

In  half  an  hour  Bitchenkov  composed,  without  seeing  the 
old  one,  a  new  copy  of  the  resolution. 

"You  lie!  You  learned  it  by  heart.  Shut  your  mouth; 
do  not  dare  to  reason  with  me!" 

The  demand  for  the  nationalisation  of  the  land  enraged 
the  governor  more  than  anything  else.  After  his  fierce  denun- 
ciation of  the  peasants  an  old  white-headed  man  spoke:  "Your 
excellency,  we  have  listened  to  your  speech.  Now  listen  to 
ours.  I  have  two  sons  in  the  war,  and  twenty-one  persons  at 
home  to  nourish  and  land  enough  for  only  one  person.  How 
shall  we  feed  ourselves?" 


244  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  governor  could  reply  only  by  the  Malthusian  theory: 
"Who  forced  you  to  reproduce  yourselves  in  this  way?" 

"That  is  a  sin  what  you  are  saying  now,"  said  the  old  man. 
"It  is  against  God." 

"Silence!     No  reasoning!"  shouted  Stolypine. 

The  assembly  of  peasants  was  sourrounded  by  Cossacks  and 
dispersed,  while  the  elected  chiefs  of  the  village  were  imprisoned. 
After  two  hours  of  violent  shouting  the  governor  demanded 
that  the  village  should  place  in  his  hands  all  its  leaders,  confess 
who  had  influenced  the  peasants  to  adopt  such  a  resolution  and 
draw  up  another  to  suit  the  official  taste.  That  evening  all 
the  village  consulted  together  over  Stolypine 's  demands. 

"Well,  old  men,  have  you  come  to  a  decision?"  asked  the 
governor  of  the  peasants  the  next  morning. 

"Yes,  your  excellency,  we  have  passed  a  resolution,"  returned 
the  mayor. 

"That  is  good;  where  is  it,  this  new  resolution  of  yours?" 

"We  have  resolved  to  stand  by  the  old  one." 

The  governor  was  enraged.  He  himself  questioned  every- 
body, but  everybody  kept  silent.  The  next  day  twenty  of  the 
most  respected  peasants  were  arrested.  Eighteen  persons  were 
imprisoned  for  a  month  and  Bitchenkov  and  an  old  man  named 
Savelieff  for  two  months. 

There  was  only  one  traitor  in  the  village,  and  when  it  was 
discovered  that  it  was  he  who  had  denounced  everybody  to 
Governor  Stolypine,  the  others  declared  a  boycott  against  him 
without  mercy.  They  burned  his  barns  twice  and  finally 
declared  to  him  categorically  that  he  must  leave  the  village. 
The  wretched  spy  went  to  his  son  at  Volsk;  but  the  son  would 
not  receive  him,  and  declared,  "  I  have  no  need  of  such  Iscariots. " 
Finally,  the  wrecked  informer  had  to  go  into  another  province. 

While  the  arrested  peasants  were  gone,  the  villagers  performed 
all  their  work  for  them,  and  even  gave  bread  and  potatoes  to 
the  poorer  families.  A  month  later  eighteen  of  the  condemned 
returned,  and  were  received  as  home-coming  heroes.  The 
commune  sent  to  meet  them  eighteen  waggons,  in  each. four 
persoiis,  the  horse  decorated  with  green  leaves  and  red 
ribbons  —  and  as  the  procession  entered  the  village  it  was 
greeted  by  the  singing  of  the  Marseillaise.      Bitchenkov  and 


THE  CZAR'S   ARMIES   OF   REVENGE  245 

Savelieff  returned  a  month  later.  For  them,  too,  a  great  cele- 
bration was  prepared. 

But,  of  course,  the  village  did  not  escape  so  easily.  Later 
Stolypine  returned,  and  after  a  two  days*  stay  departed,  leaving 
a  hundred  Cossacks,  one  officer,  and  eight  rural  guards,  to  execute 
his  orders.  From  that  time  the  "nagaikas"  commenced  to 
whistle  on  the  backs  and  heads  of  the  peasants.  The  Cossacks 
beat  not  only  the  peasants  of  Ivanovka;  they  beat  the  passers- 
by,  they  beat  everybody  that  fell  into  their  hands.  Some  of 
their  wounded  victims  they  threw  into  prison,  and  held  them 
there  without  any  medical  relief.  They  stole  everything 
they  could  lay  their  hands  on,  from  the  smallest  household 
object  to  the  grain  in  the  granary.  When  a  respected  peasant 
went,  as  representative  of  the  village,  to  the  head  man  of  the 
Cossacks  to  beg  the  cessation  of  this  persecution,  he  was  killed 
by  the  Cossacks  in  broad  daylight. 

This  is  how  Premier  Stolypine 's  orders  were  executed  when 
as  provincial  governor  he  was  travelling  about  among  the 
villages.  All  reliable  persons  in  the  province  agree  in  saying 
that  at  this  time  he  behaved  more  like  a  beast  than  a  human 
being.  This  is  the  man  the  Czar  has  selected  to  "pacify"  the 
cotmtry,  and  with  whose  labours  he  has  expressed  himself  as 
amply  pleased. 

In  addition  to  imprisonment,  flogging,  violent  death,  the 
ravishment  of  women,  the  peasants  have  had  to  endure  a  most 
serious  economic  hardship  in  consequence  of  the  Government's 
"punishment  expeditions."  Wherever  these  expeditions  have 
been  most  successful,  advantage  is  immediately  taken  by  the 
landlords  of  the  peasants'  depressed  condition  to  lower  their 
wages  and  raise  their  rents.  Undoubtedly  this  is  the  first 
object  of  the  proprietor  in  calling  for  these  expeditions.  For 
this  benefit  of  the  landlords  no  new  forms  of  economic  slavery 
have  had  to  be  invented  in  despotic  Russia;  the  old  tyrannical 
laws  have  merely  had  to  be  put  again  into  practice.  The 
Russian  laws  make  explicit  provisions  for  keeping  agricultural 
labourers  as  far  as  practicable  in  servitude. 

A  recent  circular  of  the  governor  of  Poltava  to  the  "land 
officials"  is  significant  of  the  power  the  landlord  has  over 
the  peasant  laboiu-er.     "There  is  reason  to  believe,"  says  this 


246  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

circular,  "that  the  agitation  of  the  revolutionary  parties  in 
the  country  will  be  directed  this  summer  to  bring  about  the 
suspension  of  work  by  the  agricultural  labourers.  Among  the 
means  of  combating  such  proceedings,  the  most  excellent  is  the 
quick  and  energetic  interference  of  the  authorities  and  the  use 
of  the  law  as  soon  as  the  violations  come  to  light.  The  arbitrary 
leaving  of  work  without  sufficient  ground,  is  a  cause  for  a  legal 
persecution  upon  the  complaint  of  the  employer  alone.  The 
result  is  that  damages  can  be  collected  from  the  labourer  up 
to  the  sum  of  the  contracted  wages  for  three  months.  However, 
the  judgment  of  the  land  officials  (themselves  landlords,  it  will 
be  remembered)  can  be  put  into  execution  immediately.  But 
if  the  labourer  is  bound  by  a  written  contract,  the  employer 
has  the  right  to  give  up  the  above  mentioned  damages  and  to 
turn  to  the  police  with  the  demand  to  force  the  labourer  immedi- 
ately to  the  performance  of  his  labour."  This  order,  I  will  add, 
was  strictly  enforced. 

In  the  neighbouring  province  the  landlords  turned  to  the 
prison  authorities  with  the  request  that,  on  account  of  the 
great  demand  for  field  hands,  the  prisoners  should  be  turned 
over  to  them  for  field  labour  for  a  suitable  wage.  Now  we  see 
the  perfect  trap  ready  to  catch  peasants  not  able  to  support 
themselves  from  their  own  lands.  As  soon  as  the  spirit  of 
the  disturbed  district  is  sufficiently  crushed  so  that  field  labour 
can  be  continued,  the  employers  begin  to  lower  wages  and 
raise  rents,  with  the  assurance  that  they  will  have  the  armed 
assistance  of  the  Government  to  compel  the  peasants  to  labour. 
There  are  two  ways  in  which  the  landlord  gets  his  initial  "legal" 
grip  on  the  labourer.  First,  if  the  preceding  winter  has  been 
a  bad  one,  it  was  naturally  easy  for  the  landlords  to  get  the 
peasants  to  sign  any  kind  of  a  contract  (often  for  as  little  as  a 
.third  of  the  usual  wage)  to  avoid  their  immediate  economic 
ruin  or  death  by  starvation;  with  this  piece  of  paper  in  their 
hands  the  landlords  are  masters  of  slaves  for  the  term  of  the 
contract.  Second,  if  the  peasant's  absolute  necessity  has  not 
forced  him  to  enter  into  this  "voluntary"  servitude,^  the 
proprietors  can  still  lure  him  to  enter  their  employment  tmder 
false  promises.  As  soon  as  the  peasant  begins  to  complain  of 
impossible  food,  of  the  fines  that  the  employer  is  allowed  to 


THE  CZAR'S  ARMIES   OF   REVENGE  247 

place  upon  him,  or  of  other  frauds,  and  quits  work,  the  employer 
has  a  civil  case  against  him,  which  can  be  judged  immediately 
by  his  landlord  friend,  the  "land  official."  After  the  judgment 
the  peasant  has  either  to  go  to  labour  immediately  under  the 
old  conditions  or  be  arrested,  and  if  he  is  arrested  he  is  again 
subject  to  be  driven  to  the  fields,  as  the  ancient  slaves  of  Greece 
or  Rome. 

Every  "punishment  expedition"  has  been  followed  imme- 
diately by  the  lowering  of  wages  and  the  raising  of  rents.  Protest 
against  these  harsher  conditions  has  meant  a  new  expedition. 
The  peasants  on  the  estate  of  Prince  Kotzebue  in  the  province 
of  Poltava  told  me  how,  it  being  impossible  for  them  to  keep 
alive  either  as  tenants  on  account  of  the  high  rents,  or  as 
labourers  on  wages  of  twenty  to  thirty  kopecks  (ten  to  fifteen 
cents)  a  day,  they  had  therefore  decided  to  quit  work  and  not 
to  pay  rent.  Of  course  the  Cossacks  came,  and  were  still  there 
at  the  time  of  my  visit.  They  beat  the  villagers  from  day  to 
day,  and  the  discontented  peasants  were  sent  away  by  the  dozen 
and  sometimes  in  shoals  of  as  many  as  fifty  at  a  time.  The 
result  of  the  strike,  followed  by  the  "punishment  expedition," 
was  that  wages  had  again  been  lowered  and  rents  raised. 

But  although  the  peasants'  attempt  to  better  their  economic 
conditions  by  organised  effort  is  checkmated  by  the  guns 
and  whips  of  the  Cossacks,  the  peasants  have  by  no  means  been 
terrorised  as  the  Government  desires;  they  cannot  "strike" 
successfully  as  this  is  physically  impossible  against  an  armed 
force,  but  they  can  still  plan  and  work  toward  revolution. 
They  are  ever  learning  new  determination  and  courage  in  the 
great  war.  They  are  just  reaching  the  height  of  that  primitive 
lynch  justice  which  doubtless  has  preserved  the  existence  of 
many  communities  under  barbarous  surroundings.  If  they 
should  ever  learn  the  use  of  this  measure  as  did  the  pioneers  of 
our  West,  it  would  be  an  inconceivably  powerful  instrument  in 
their  emancipation.  Here  is  a  recent  story  that  shows  the  new 
practice,  adapted  especially  to  landlords: 

The  landlord  Pavlovsky  of  the  town  of  Shestkovka,  in  the  govern- 
ment of  Cherson,  had  noticed  a  peasant's  horse  while  riding  through  his 
fields.  He  turned  to  the  peasant,  who  had  come  to  get  the  horse,  with 
the  question  why  he  had  let  his  horse  on  another's  field.     The  peasant 


248  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

answered  that  the  horse  himself  had  run  away  to  the  place.  Thereupon 
Pavlovsky  fired  a  shot  and  killed  the  horse.  The  owner  of  the  horse 
went  thereupon  with  other  peasants  to  the  house  of  Pavlovsky  and 
declared  to  Pavlovsky 's  people  that  the  landlord  had  shot  his  horse  and 
that  he,  its  owner,  would  take  instead  a  horse  of  the  landlord.  There 
arose  a  conflict  between  the  people  of  the  estate  and  the  peasants,  during 
which  the  people  of  the  estate  fired  several  shots,  wounded  the  owner  of 
the  killed  horse  and  killed  his  son.  Out  of  fear  of  the  lynch  justice  of 
the  peasants  the  landlord's  people  hastened  to  the  station  where  two 
of  them  surrendered  themselves  to  the  police  and  the  third  was  arrested. 
As  we  were  afterwards  informed,  a  crowd  of  the  peasants  marched  to 
the  station,  broke  into  the  office,  dragged  out  the  landlord's  people  and 
practised  lynch  justice  on  them  by  beating  them  to  death. 

The  new  lynch  justice  of  the  peasants  is  not  always  directed 
against  the  landlords,  but  also  against  the  landlord's  allies, 
the  local  officials.  In  many  places  the  so-called  "land  officials" 
have  been  resigning  by  the  wholesale,  and  it  is  very  difficult 
to  find  new  men  to  take  their  places.  In  one  province  this 
class  of  official  does  not  dare  to  appear  in  the  villages  without 
the  accompaniment  of  several  others  of  the  same  class  and  the 
accumulated  bodyguards  of  the  whole,  that  is  to  say,  a  htmdred 
or  more  rural  guards.  In  Voronege  province  the  Government 
has  to  keep  transferring  the  heads  of  the  district  police  from 
one  district  to  another,  in  the  hope  of  preventing  in  this  way 
the  sharp  conflicts  that  prevail  as  soon  as  these  persons  become 
personally  known  to  the  peasants.  In  one  district  of  Jaroslav, 
of  four  "land  officials"  only  one  remained  and  this  one  feared 
to  wear  the  uniform.  Another,  after  holding  the  position  only 
a  month  and  a  half,  fell  into  acute  insanity.  He  used  to  write 
petitions  in  which  he  implored  the  peasants  not  to  tear  him 
to  pieces  but  simply  to  hang  him.  He  had  to  be  taken  to  the 
asylum. 

It  is  becoming  rather  less  common  to  attempt  to  resist  the 
armed  authorities  by  means  of  pitched  battles  such  as  took 
place  in  thousands  of  cases  in  1905  and  1906.  At  that  time 
it  had  become  almost  a  custom  for  the  peasants  to  go  up  into 
the  church  tower  when  the  enemy  approached  and  to  sound 
the  alarm.  The  immense  crowds  of  peasants  that  would 
then  gather  were  often  equal  even  to  a  company  of  armed 
soldiers.  Now,  when  Cossacks  come  to  a  village,  they  first  of 
all  go  to  the  church  and  tie  up  the  tongue  of  the  bell  or  take  it 


THE  CZAR'S  ARMIES   OF   REVENGE  249 

altogether  away.  In  some  villages,  even,  "unknown  thieves" 
(the  police)  have  succeeded  in  stealing  the  bell. 

More  successful  is  the  well-known  war  measure  of  burning 
down  the  enemy's  property  and  source  of  supplies.  The  land- 
lords' mansions  are  still  being  burned  by  the  peasants  in  every 
section  of  the  country.  So  far  has  this  gone  that  now,  to  quote 
from  the  conservative  organ,  Navoe  Vremya,  "not  a  single  fire 
insurance  company  in  Russia  issues  any  policies  on  farm  stock 
or  buildings,  owing  to  the  enormous  spread  of  incendiarism. 
The  landlords  for  a  long  time  concealed  the  facts,  misleading 
both  the  companies  and  the  Government,  but  the  true  state  of 
affairs  at  last  leaked  out."  This  is  the  most  serious  and  pressing 
questfon  that  confronts  the  landlords  to-day.  A  committee 
recently  called  on  Prime  Minister  Stolypine  with  a  plan  of 
rehabilitating  the  fire  insurance  on  country  estates.  Stolypine 
approved,  but  of  course  could  see  no  way  by  which  the  Govern- 
ment could  participate  in  such  an  unprofitable  business. 

But  neither  Mr.  Stolypine  nor  any  others  of  the  savages  in 
civilised  clothing  that  are  executing  the  Czar's  orders  have 
had  or  can  have  any  permanent  success  in  suppressing  the 
growing  and  invincible  revolutionary  spirit  that  is  already 
animating  a  large  part  of  Russia's  hundred  million  peasants. 
If  the  country  people  are  on  the  defensive  at  the  present  moment 
it  is  not  that  they  lack  the  will  for  the  most  aggressive  and 
violent  warfare  against  the  Government,  but  merely  that  for 
the  moment  they  lack  the  power.  Whether  this  situation  can 
long  continue  may  most  seriously  be  questioned. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  VILLAGE  AGAINST  THE  CZAR A  STATE  OP  WAR 

WAS  the  spirit  of  rebellion  crushed  in  the  winter  of  1906 
by  the  twenty-five  thousand  exiles  and  arrests  and 
the  hundred  thousand  flayed  backs  of  the  insurrectionists? 
In  Russia  at  the  time  this  was  the  mooted  question  among  all 
profound  students  of  the  revolutionary  movement. 

There  was  another  great  question.  Had  the  peasants  done 
their  best  and  finally  become  discouraged?  Events  soon 
proved  that  the  peasants  had  lost  nothing  of  their  rebellious 
instinct.  They  had  only  been  forced  to  change  the  tactics  of 
revolt.  The  spring  of  1906  had  hardly  commenced  when  a  new 
movement  began,  equally  widespread  with  the  last  and  cover- 
ing nearly  all  the  rich  agricultural  section  of  Russia.  A  strike 
of  agricultural  labourers  was  organised  against  all  landlords 
who  worked  their  own  land,  and  a  movement  against  high 
rents  was  directed  against  those  who  farmed  out  their  estates. 

The  strike  was  highly  organized,  aggressive,  and  violent. 
In  all  cases  the  action  was  by  village,  often  in  pursuance  of 
resolutions  of  the  official  village  meeting.  In  one  government 
of  the  south  not  only  were  whole  villages  represented  in  district 
committees,  but  the  district  committee  sent  their  representa- 
tive to  a  central  convention  of  the  whole  government.  The 
strike  was  aggressive,  because  the  peasants  were  asking  for  an 
increase  in  wages  that  amounted  often  to  200  or  300  per  cent. 
It  was  violent,  in  that  strike-breaking  peasants  were  not  only 
beaten  by  their  neighbours,  but  often  also  their  houses  were 
burned  over  their  heads.  Its  results  were  highly  satisfactory 
from  the  peasants'  standpoint,  the  rate  of  wages  per  hour  being 
more  than  doubled.  Peasants  who  were  getting  thirty  or  fifty 
kopeks  for  a  twelve  or  fourteen-hour  day  were  often  paid' one 
or  two  rubles  for  a  day  of  ten  hours.  In  some  cases  those  land- 
lords who  could  not  afford  to  pay  the  wages  demanded  were 

250 


A   STATE   OF   WAR  251 

told  that  they  might  sell  their  land  to  the  village,  but  that 
the  peasants'  terms  would  not  be  lowered.  The  movement 
against  high  rents  was  equally  successful,  some  villages  in  the 
east  paying  fifteen  rubles  where  before  they  had  paid  forty. 

This  was  the  movement  of  the  spring.  The  summer  again 
marked  another  step  forward  toward  revolution.  The  landlords 
had  been  beaten  on  the  economic  field  but  they  were  more 
embittered  than  ever  by  their  new  difficulties  and  more  ready 
than  before  to  make  use  of  their  allies,  the  Cossacks  and  police. 
So  after  the  first  Duma  had  met  and  it  was  evident  even  to  the 
most  credulous  villages  (some  never  had  believed)  that  the 
Czar  was  going  to  grant  none  of  the  people's  demands,  the 
aggressive  economic  movement  was  supplemented  by  a  still 
more  aggressive  attack  against  the  landlords,  who  were  justly 
blamed  for  a  large  part  of  the  Czar's  stubbornness.  The  princi- 
ple of  the  boycott  was  applied  to  the  landlords,  their  servants 
and  the  police.  Every  relation  between  the  landlord  and  the 
village  was  made  a  source  of  trouble  and  even  of  combat.  Some 
villages  refused  to  pay  taxes  to  the  zemstvos  in  order  that  the 
landlord  might  be  forced  to  build  his  own  roads.  Others  refused 
to  allow  the  landlord's  horses  and  cattle  even  to  cross  the 
village  land,  or  to  furnish  horses  or  lodging  to  the  police.  They 
beat,  burned  out,  or  expelled  from  the  village,  any  peasant 
who  did  the  landord  or  the  Government  a  service. 

But  this  was  only  the  first  step.  In  very  many  villages  ths 
movement  went  much  further.  In  the  fall  of  1 905  the  peasants 
were  burning  the  landlords'  mansions  in  the  daytime.  In 
the  summer  of  1 906  they  were  burning  their  farms  and  granaries 
at  night.  At  first  the  destruction  was  merely  a  matter  of  war 
fare.  Then  it  became  the  result  of  a  bitter  spirit  of  revenge. 
This  spirit  has  gone  still  further,  and  very  many  guards  and 
superintendents  and  a  considerable  number  of  landlords  have 
been  killed;  also  many  of  the  village  police  and  even  members 
of  the  newly  created  military  arm,  the  rural  guards. 

The  reign  of  terror  in  some  sections  is  already  very  similar 
to  that  of  the  towns  and  mining  regions.  Recently,  in  the 
province  in  which  Odessa  is  situated,  fires  and  murders  became 
so  frequent  that  the  governor  actually  felt  himself  constrained 
to  establish  a  night  patrol.     Does  not  this  order  indicate  that 


252  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  rural  revolution  in  this  section  has  gotten  beyond  the  control 
of  the  authorities?  Imagine  the  practicability  of  patrolling 
large  sections  of  rural  Russia  by  night.  Everyv/here,  too,  the 
landlords  are  forced  to  hire  Cossacks  or  special  watchmen  to 
guard  their  estates  —  an  equally  impractical,  because  alto- 
gether too  costly,  measure.  In  some  districts  the  nobility 
do  not  even  dare  to  go  out  to  pick  berries  or  mushrooms  without 
their  Cossack  guards ;  in  others  almost  every  landlord  has  left  the 
country  for  the  capital  or  provincial  towns.  With  the  sudden 
fall  of  rents  in  the  country  has  gone  an  equally  general  and  rapid 
rise  in  the  rents  of  good  houses  in  the  provincial  towns. 

This  class  war  of  pillage  and  arson  and  murder  had  already 
brought  about  concrete  results  for  the  peasants.  I  have  spoken 
of  the  moderate  measure  of  reform  the  Government  had  pro- 
mulgated, largely  under  landlord  pressure;  I  have  also  mentioned 
the  rise  in  wages  and  the  fall  in  rents.  A  much  more  remarkable 
and  solid  benefit  has  fallen  to  the  peasants  as  a  reward  for 
their  successful  warfare  —  the  landlords  are  selling  their  estates. 
In  the  single  year  since  these  present  agrarian  disorders  began 
more  than  a  tenth  of  the  estates  of  all  Russia  have  been  offered 
for  sale.  What  is  still  more  important  is  that  the  peasants, 
expecting  a  far  more  considerable  fall  in  prices,  if  not  a  free 
division  of  the  landlords'  property,  have  often  refused  to  buy. 

The  peasants  were  rapidly,  and  with  comparative  ease,  getting 
the  better  of  the  landlords,  even  to  driving  them  from  the 
countryside,  when  the  Government  redoubled  its  oppressive 
measures,  restored  the  balance  of  power  in  favour  of  the  land- 
lords, and,  as  I  have  shown  in  the  preceding  chapter,  helped 
them  to  win  back  more  than  they  had  lost.  The  struggle  with 
the  Government,  backed  as  it  is  by  the  consolidated  power 
of  the  landlords  and  those  allies  and  relatives  of  theirs,  the  army 
officers  and  the  bureaucrats,  is  a  far  more  serious  and  pro- 
tracted matter —  is,  in  fact,  the  very  substance  of  the  war  of 
the  revolution.  In  this  part  of  the  struggle  the  peasants  have 
had  far  less  success,  and  up  to  the  present  time  they  have  gotten 
decidedly  the  worst  of  it. 

But  let  us  not  suppose  that  the  Government  is  altogether 
invulnerable.  In  every  village  it  has  given  the  people  hostages 
in  the  persons  of  the  village  policeman  and  the  village  priest. 


A   STATE   OF   WAR  253 

Both  are  the  subject  of  constant  persecution  in  those  sections 
of  the  country  that  are  most  advanced.  In  many  cases  these 
local  representatives  of  the  Czarism  are  already  dominated 
by  village  opinion;  more  particularly,  of  course,  the  priests. 
In  Kasan  the  peasants  captured  several  of  the  local  police 
functionaries  and  held  them  until  the  Government  liberated 
an  imprisoned  leader  of  the  revolution.  Besides  these  personal 
pledges,  there  is  in  every  village  a  valuable  property  pledge  in 
the  shape  of  the  Government  saloon  from  which  the  Czarism 
receives  a  third  of  its  annual  income.  Every  day  the  official 
Russian  telegrams  report  the  robbery  or  destruction  of  some 
of  these  saloons.  How  many  are  really  attacked  or  destroyed 
cannot  be  known.  New  villages  are  daily  taking  up  the  campaign 
against  this  Government  monopoly,  and  a  new  plan  of  attack  has 
been  devised  —  the  boycott.  The  village  meeting  decides  that 
the  peasants  shall  not  drink;  an  agreed  schedule  of  fines  is 
arranged  for  all  those  who  do  —  one  ruble  for  the  first  drink,  three 
for  the  second,  five  for  the  third,  and  expulsion  for  the  fourth. 

So  successfully  have  these  various  attacks  hit  at  the  Govern- 
ment revenue  that  the  authorities  have  been  forced  to  the  most 
extreme  measures  of  protection.  Already  all  post-offices, 
railway  stations,  and  every  visible  form  of  property  have  had 
to  be  guarded  by  soldiers  or  police.  Now  the  same  becomes 
true  of  all  of  the  tens  of  thousands  of  vodka  shops  in  Russia  — 
a  sufficient  sign  in  itself  of  the  revolution's  strength.  Through 
raising  the  price  of  vodka  to  the  very  limit  the  traffic  will  bear, 
the  Government  has  succeeded  so  far  in  retaining  the  level  of  its 
revenue,  but  it  is  only  a  question  of  a  short  time  before  the 
State  budget  must  show  an   enormous  loss. 

The  measures  of  physical  protection  for  the  saloons  are 
the  least  interesting  of  the  Government's  policies  in  this  matter. 
In  one  government  of  the  south,  the  governor-general  has  issued 
an  order  that  any  village  which  has  boycotted  the  saloon  must 
be  made  to  pay  in  direct  taxes  the  same  sum  which  that  saloon 
produced  for  the  Government  the  year  before.  The  Govern- 
ment has  always  encouraged  the  use  of  the  vodka  poison.  It 
is  now  compeUing  it  by  nagaikas  and  bayonets. 

The  warfare  of  the  village  against  the  Government  is  being 
worked  up  into  a  science.     The  revolutionary  bodies  are  direct- 


254  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

ing  the  activities,  but  the  peasants  are  quick  enough  to  under- 
stand. Every  possible  form  of  worrying  the  Government, 
of  upsetting  the  authority  of  the  local  officials,  of  cutting  off  the 
Government's  income  from  the  village,  of  implanting  the  spirit 
of  mutiny  among  the  new  recruits,  of  coercing  the  landlords, 
is  being  embodied  by  the  revolutionists  into  a  regular  revolu- 
tionary code.  Congresses  of  local  and  village  committees 
have  been  held  all  over  Russia  to  discuss  the  best  means  for 
carrying  out  the  war.  It  is  generally  recognised  that  the  time 
for  concerted  action  in  the  country  at  large  has  not  yet  arrived, 
and  it  is  evident  to  the  outside  observer  that  it  will  not  even 
arrive  so  soon  as  the  revolutionists  hope.  What  is  sought  now 
is  not  the  common  action  of  several  villages,  but  the  comparative 
study  of  the  best  modes  of  action  for  each  individual  com- 
munity. So  well  do  the  villages  understand  this  that  some 
have  not  only  themselves  absorbed  the  new  programme,  but 
have  undertaken  to  spread  it  far  and  wide  among  the  neigh- 
bouring communities.  I  visited  one  village,  for  instance,  where 
practically  everybody  was  active  in  one  way  or  another  in  this 
revolutionary  work,  and  where  the  young  men  seemed  almost 
without  exception  to  be  members  of  the  fighting  organisations 
of  the  revolution.  It  is  especially  in  those  villages  where  the 
peasants  have  been  beaten  by  the  Cossacks  or  imprisoned 
that  the  feeling  runs  most  high  and  the  action  takes  the  most 
aggressive  and  intelligent  form. 

This  is  the  situation  at  the  present  moment.  There  are  also 
ominous  preparations  for  a  far  more  serious  and  violent  manner 
of  warfare.  In  several  of  the  leading  provinces  the  villages 
are  making  every  effort  to  arm  and  to  train  up  a  secret  village 
militia  for  future  use.  In  the  government  of  Saratov  nearly 
every  one  of  the  fifteen  hundred  villages  has  its  secret  committee, 
and  nearly  every  one  of  these  committees  has  more  or  less 
arms.  Some  committees  are  small,  consisting  of  half  a  dozen 
members.  Others  include  a  hundred  or  more  —  all  the  young 
rrien  of  the  village.  In  some  cases  the  committee  has  only  a 
few  old  revolvers  and  guns ;  in  others  the  peasants  are  provided 
with  modem  rifles.  These  local  committees  are  all  organised 
under  the  district  committees,  and  the  district  committees 
under  the  committees  of  the  Government. 


A   STATE   OF   WAR  255 

The  revolutionary  committee  of  Saratov  is  preparing  daily 
for  future  needs.  The  local  militia  are  being  secretly  drilled, 
taught  how  to  use  their  weapons  and  educated  in  the  art  of 
guerilla  war.  All  the  roads,  bridges,  and  railway  lines  are 
being  studied  with  the  end  of  accomplishing  the  destruction 
of  the  means  of  communication  in  the  quickest  possible  manner 
when  the  moment  arrives.  Of  course,  the  peasant  militia 
has  the  fullest  assurance  of  the  support  of  the  whole  Railway 
Union  in  this  plan.  Saratov  is  the  model  province  of  Russia 
from  the  standpoint  of  peasant  revolt,  but  many  others,  espe- 
cially among  its  neighbours  and  those  provinces  nearest  to  the 
Black  Sea,  are  following  Saratov's  example. 

Until  a  short  time  ago  there  seemed  to  be  one  fatal  lack 
in  the  revolutionist  plan  —  the  means  with  which  to  purchase 
the  large  supplies  of  arms  that  will  be  needed  before  this  guerilla 
war  can  be  put  on  the  same  footing  that  it  has  reached  in  the 
Caucasus  and  the  Baltic  provinces.  There  are  now  scarcely 
a  hundred  thousand  rifles  among  the  revolutionists,  even  includ- 
ing these  outlying  parts  of  the  empire.  There  must  be  several 
times  that  number  before  the  guerilla  war  can  be  successfully 
begun  in  the  central  parts  of  the  country.  The  money  for  this 
purpose  was  entirely  wanting  a  year  ago,  but  within  the  past 
year  the  well  planned  and  executed  robberies  of  the  Govern- 
ment officers  and  large  banks  by  the  revolutionists  (the  robberies 
of  the  private  institutions  were  of  course  undertaken  only  by 
the  most  extreme  wing)  have  partly  supplied  the  lack.  Approx- 
imately some  ten  million  rubles  have  been  obtained  in  this  way 
—  sufficient,  perhaps,  to  justify  the  carrying  of  the  guerilla 
war  into  the  heart  of  rural  Russia  as  soon  as  the  guns  have 
been  smuggled  over  the  border,  or  secured  by  official  corruption 
within  the  realm. 

The  peasants  are  striving  for  their  liberty  at  a  terrible  cost, 
of  which  the  blood  tribute  is  the  least  important  item.  All 
this  sacrifice  of  life,  all  the  misery  and  hardship  that  it  must 
entail,  are  not  a  very  large  price  for  the  Russian  peasants  to 
pay  for  emancipation  from  age-long  oppression,  famine,  and 
misery.  The  worst  part  of  the  situation  is  the  reaction  on 
their  own  character  of  the  violence  to  which  the  Government 
forces  the  people  to  resort.     When  the  peasant  gets  used  to 


256  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

killing  overseers  and  police,  he  must  have  become  more  or  less- 
accustomed  to  the  shedding  of  blood  —  as  brutalised,  perhaps,  as 
soldiers  during  a  war.  But  he  cannot  and  will  not  stop  there. 
Already  the  villager's  hand  is  raised  against  his  fellow-villager. 
The  soldiers  of  brutal  regiments  that  are  still  "loyal "  to  the  Czar 
are  beaten  by  the  villagers  when  they  return  home.  Peasants 
that  refuse  to  take  part  in  the  general  revolutionary  movement 
or  strike,  are  beaten  or  slain. 

Even  this  is  not  the  worst.  Some  villages  may  have  among 
them  no  "traitors"  to  the  cause;  but  there  is  in  nearly  every 
village  a  small  class  of  peasants  who  have  always  been,  and 
may  for  some  time  remain,  openly  loyal  to  the  Czar.  These 
are  the  privileged  —  the  village  usurers,  the  peasant  landlords, 
the  small  merchants,  the  mail  carriers,  the  contractors,  the 
Government  saloon-keepers  and  others  favoured  by  the  officials. 
They  are  usually  only  a  half  dozen  or  dozen  families  out  of  a 
hundred  or  two,  but  they  are  among  the  most  active  of  all. 
Everywhere  among  the  families  of  the  common  peasants  there 
are  also  a  few  that  are  inclined  to  follow  the  lead  of  this  village 
aristocracy.  Between  these  and  the  majority  of  the  peasants 
there  is  arising  the  most  brutal  and  terrible  war.  The  victory 
is  not  so  easily  with  the  majority  as  it  might  seem.  A  strong 
village  policeman  and  a  few  well-hidden  spies,  a  detachment 
of  rural  guards  or  Cossacks  in  the  village  or  near  at  hand,  will 
give  the  advantage  entirely  to  the  favoured  few.  In  such  cases 
some  horrible  incidents  have  arisen.  The  peasant  aristocrats, 
following  the  illustrious  example  of  the  Czar,  have  even  insti- 
tuted so-called  military  courts  for  the  execution  of  the  leaders 
of  sedition,  and  have  executed  such  of  their  enemies  as  they 
could  lay  their  hands  on.  With  others,  also  emulating  the 
Czar,  they  have  proceeded  to  apply  the  well-established  custom 
of  the  "red  cock" — that  is,  they  have  burned  down  their 
enemies'  houses  over  their  heads. 

But  this  last  is  a  dangerous  procedure,  for  it  invites  a  fierce 
retaliation.  The  red  cock  is  a  principal  weapon  of  the  revolu- 
tionary element  in  the  village,  and  as  the  property  is  to  a  large 
degree  in  the  hands  of  the  reactionary  few,  these  few  are  the 
principal  sufferers  in  this  kind  of  a  war.  Such  village  feuds, 
resiilting  in  the  burning  down  of  the  houses  of  the  enemies, 


A   STATE   OF   WAR  257 

and  sometimes  by  accident  of  neighbours*  houses,  or  of  the 
whole  village  as  well,  have  always  been  frequent.  Since  the 
revolution  began  this  incendiarism  has  doubled,  and  to  the  other 
plagues  of  Russia  —  war,  famine,  pillage,  and  Cossacks  —  must 
be  added  fire.  In  the  short  space  of  one  year  there  were  over 
three  thousand  such  fires  in  a  single  government  of  the  fifty 
of  European  Russia. 

Worse  than  the  public  executions  in  the  village  and  worse 
than  fire,  is  the  secret  murder  by  night.  Of  course  when  the 
war  reaches  this  stage  it  cannot  last  long,  as  the  numbers  are 
overwhelming  on  the  side  of  the  poverty-stricken  many.  But 
the  spirit  of  bloodshed  has  been  turned  against  neighbours, 
an  infinitely  more  demoralising  fact  than  the  killing  of  those 
regarded  as  natural  enemies,  the  landlords  and  police. 

With  this  loss  of  regard  for  life  comes  an  equal  disregard 
of  personal  property  and  every  other  form  of  personal  right. 
From  pillaging  the  landlords  it  is  a  short  step  to  pillaging  the 
rich  peasants.  The  latter  reply  where  they  can  with  a  forced 
confiscation  of  the  weaker  peasants'  goods.  Soon  a  period  of 
plunder  sets  in,  directed  very  largely  against  those  with  whom 
the  peasants  have  their  scores  to  settle  —  that  is,  the  rich 
peasants,  the  landlords,  and  the  police. 

The  whole  picture  of  the  immediate  future  of  the  Russian  vil- 
lage is  such  a  terrible  one  that  few  large-hearted  and  cultivated 
Russians  can  bear  to  contemplate  it.  Many,  in  revolt  against 
the  only  picture  their  reason  tells  them  to  expect,  will  yet  deny 
some  of  the  most  obvious  facts.  Others,  unable  to  argue  away 
the  facts,  give  up  all  hope  and  can  see  no  end  to  the  demoralisa- 
tion once  it  gains  the  upper  hand.  I  have  been  forced  to  confess, 
indeed,  that  the  spread  and  success  of  the  revolution  depends 
probably,  not  so  much  on  its  successful  organisation,  as  on  the 
disorganisation  of  the  Government  and  on  the  spread  of  the  spirit 
of  rebellion  and  desperation  in  the  mind  of  the  individual  peas- 
ants. Evidently  individual  rebellion  is  subject  to  all  the  limi- 
tations of  the  individual  rebel.  A  growing  disregard  for  life, 
property,  industry,  and  order,  is  inevitable  as  long  as  the  revo- 
lution continues.  The  powers  that  are  maintaining  the  Russian 
Government  to-day  can  undoubtedly  force  the  nation  to  this 
fearful    and    protracted    disorganisation.      The    revolutionary 


2S8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

organisations  and  organised  forms  of  revolt  that  make  against 
this  demoralisation,  the  Government  can  defeat  and  destroy. 
Against  millions  of  individual  rebels,  who,  however  unorganised, 
are  ready  to  give  up  everything  for  the  cause,  the  Government 
can  accomplish  nothing. 

It  would  be  the  grossest  error  to  conclude  that  there  is  no 
organisation  of  the  revolutionary  forces.  Only  a  few  pages 
back  I  have  spoken  of  the  effort  at  secret  military  organisation. 
In  addition  there  is  a  constant  and  often  successful  effort  to 
create  organisations  of  every  kind,  though  such  organisations 
are  organisations  only  in  an  educational  sense.  The  personnel 
of  both  leaders  and  rank  and  file  is  constantly  shifting. 
Continuous  and  concerted  action  is  out  of  the  question. 

The  PeavSants*  Union  gathered  together,  in  a  single  programme 
and  a  single  set  of  revolutionary  tactics,  the  best  opinion  among 
the  Russian  radicals  as  well  as  the  most  widely  accepted 
opinions  of  the  peasants.  It  perfected  and  developed  its 
programme  through  repeated  national  conferences,  and  it 
finally  succeeded  in  spreading  a  knowledge  of  its  tactics  in 
nearly  every  village  of  the  land.  This  is  organisation  in  the 
deepest  spiritual  sense.  Its  central  committee  was  imprisoned; 
its  local  committees  were  exiled;  all  its  most  openly  active 
members  were  beaten  or  thrown  into  jail.  Yet  the  idea  of  the 
union  lives,  and  it  unites  the  peasants  in  a  common  effort 
for  a  common  end.  The  union  remains  as  popular  as  ever 
among  the  peasantry.  Whole  villages  are  still  anxious  to  be 
admitted  to  its  somewhat  mysterious  folds.  They  know  its 
programme;  they  do  not  and  cannot  know  the  personnel  of  its 
organisation.  The  intelligent  peasants  of  nearly  every  village 
will  tell  you  that  they  stand  for  the  Peasants'  Union.  One 
peasant  summed  the  matter  up  in  this  way: 

"Of  course  I  am  for  the  Peasants*  Union,  whatever  I  may 
think  of  other  organisations.  It  is  like  the  hen  that  spreads 
its  wings  over  all  the  smaller  revolutionary  brood." 

After  the  Peasants'  Union  came  another  organisation,  equally 
successful  and  equally  popular.  The  radical  and  revolutionary 
peasants  sent  by  the  villages  to  represent  them  in  the  Duma 
formed  themselves  into  the  "Labour  Group."  This  group 
adopted   practically   the   entire   programme   of   the   Peasants' 


A   STATE   OF   WAR  259 

Union,  and  urged  the  most  advanced  and  democratic  demands 
along  every  line.  It  was  the  members  of  this  group,  it  will  be 
recalled,  that  kept  themselves  in  daily  touch  with  the  villages 
all  over  Russia  while  the  first  Dimia  was  in  session,  and  who 
issued,  after  the  Duma  was  closed,  the  sensational  appeal  to 
arms.  This  appeal  is  the  most  dangerous  document  to  the 
Government  that  has  ever  been  published.  It  has  not  reached 
all  the  villages,  but  it  has  certainly  reached  a  large  majority. 
It  is  so  violent  and  desperate  in  tone  that  there  are  doubtless 
some  villages  to  which  it  would  not  appeal.  However,  it  has 
been  circulated  broadcast,  has  met  with  approval  in  all  directions, 
and  in  the  villages  that  had  received  it  I  foimd  it  had  called 
forth  the  most  cordial  and  enthusiastic  endorsement.  A  large 
part  of  the  members  of  the  Labour  Group,  like  the  organisers  of 
the  Peasants'  Union,  are  now  in  prison  or  exile;  but  many  are 
the  villagers  who  have  answered  the  call  of  the  village  bell  to 
arms,  or  rather  to  sticks  and  pitchforks,  when  there  has  been 
a  need  to  rally  to  the  assistance  of  these  members.  Though 
known  to  thousands  of  peasants,  and  travelling  about  freely 
after  the  first  Duma  was  dissolved,  many,  perhaps  half,  of  the 
members  of  the  group  were  enabled  by  the  peasants'  aid  to 
escape  abroad.  The  group's  proclamation  lives  in  the  peasants' 
minds,  gains  ground  every  day,  and  may  yet  serve  as  a  rallying 
cry  for  the  great  revolt. 

Through  these  organisations,  or  frameworks  of  organisations, 
a  very  large  proportion  of  the  villages  have  been  thoroughly 
ripened  and  prepared  for  revolt.  Of  course  the  revolt  may 
never  occur.  It  is  impossible  to  say  at  what  time  the  Govern- 
ment may  become  sufficiently  frightened  to  make  a  complete 
surrender.  The  peasants  will  be  satisfied  with  nothing  less 
than  complete  surrender,  and  the  only  proposal  that  has 
appealed  to  them  so  far  is  that  a  constitutional  assembly  be 
instantly  convened.  If  the  Government  shotdd  not  siirrender^ 
as  it  shows  no  signs  of  doing  at  the  present  time,  the  guerilla 
war  will  some  day  take  a  more  terrible  form.  The  country 
will  swarm  with  an  army  of  guerilla  bands,  and  the  Government 
authorities  may  be  forced  to  retire  from  the  villages  to  the  strong 
places  the  Cossacks  are  able  to  hold.  The  peasants  will  already 
have  gained  part  of  that  for  which  they  are  contending.     The 


26o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

revolution  would  have  to  wait  for  further  success  on  the  capture 
of  some  sufficiently  important  stronghold  to  serve  as  a  centre 
for  an  insurrectionary  government  and  for  the  formation  and 
organisation  of  a  regular  revolutionary  force.  Even  then  the 
Government  armies  might  be  able  to  put  up  a  terrific  resistance. 

But  whether  events  ever  proceed  so  far  or  not,  it  is  the 
imminent  possibility  that  they  may  which  constitutes  the  hope 
of  the  revolution,  and  the  only  factor  that  is  able  to  force  from 
the  autocratic  Government  such  fundamental  and  revolutionary 
changes  as,  in  the  minds  of  every  important  element  of  the 
Russian  people,  are  now  absolutely  essential  to  the  development 
of  Russia. 

The  Russian  people,  perhaps  more  than  any  other,  deplore 
all  warfare.  They  stand  squarely  for  the  abolition  of  govern- 
mental violence  in  every  form.  But  until  the  present  inhuman 
despotism  is  done  away  with,  neither  war,  nor  capital  punish- 
ment, nor  imprisonment  and  exile  without  trial  can  be  done 
away  with.  War  is  the  excuse  for  the  Czarism's  existence. 
Administrative  punishment  and  execution  are  its  sole  means 
of  support.  It  is  in  a  last  hope  of  putting  an  end,  perhaps 
forever,  to  war  and  bloodshed  that  the  people  have  declared 
war  on  the  Czarism  and  are  ready  to  pay  with  their  own  blood 
for  victory. 


CHAPTER  XI 


WAITING   FOR   CIVIL   WAR 


THE  military  aspect  of  the  Russian  revolution  must  finally 
decide  the  great  struggle.  Nor  does  this  military  aspect 
concern  Russia  alone.  The  United  States  and  several  other 
modem  nations  think  they  are  permanently  free.  But  if  the 
art  of  modem  warfare  is  ever  so  developed  that  a  fraction  of  a 
nation,  the  Government,  has  at  any  time  the  physical  power 
to  keep  the  rest  of  the  nation  in  subjection,  freedom  has  no 
concrete  foundation  on  which  to  rest.  Our  liberties  depend 
largely  on  the  character  of  the  arts  of  war.  If  coercive  govern- 
ment is  possible,  it  is  because  the  modem  means  of  war  give  a 
coercive  government  the  physical  superiority. 

Since  the  invention  of  repeating  rifles,  rapid-fire  cannon,  and 
machine  guns,  no  prominent  people  has  been  in  general  armed 
revolt  against  its  government.  We  can  neither  say  how  heavy 
the  popular  majority  would  have  to  be  to  win  against  the 
disciplined  and  centralised  armies  of  the  government,  nor  if  the 
people  did  win,  can  we  say  what  would  be  the  slaughter  the 
victory  would  entail.  Terrible  and  unspiritual  as  these 
conjectures  are,  they  are  of  supreme  moment  and  form  one  of 
the  greatest  questions  that  the  Russian  revolution  has  to 
answer.  Some  of  the  Russian  conditions  are  special  to  that 
country,  but  this  much  is  general  —  the  Government  has  a 
monopoly  of  most  of  the  machinery  of  modern  warfare,  the 
possession  of  the  strategic  points,  the  use  of  a  large,  disciplined, 
and  centralised  army  of  professional  fighting  men. 

For  more  than  two  years  past  the  Russian  Government  has 
practically  been  at  war  with  its  people.  Military  law  prevails 
throughout  the  whole  empire.  The  military  courts  are  backed 
by  an  enormous  military  power.  The  war  against  the  people 
is  being  carried  on  by  a  full  score  of  modern  army  corps.  An 
army  of  more  than  two  hundred  thousand  men  is  holding  down 

261 


262  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  Poles,  armies  of  from  fifty  thousand  to  one  hundred  thousand 
are  burning  and  hanging  in  the  Caucasus  and  the  Baltic 
provinces.  Armies  almost  as  large  are  the  sole  means  of 
preventing  insurrections  practically  en  masse  of  the  people  of 
St.  Petersburg  and  Moscow.  Every  city  in  Russia  is  an  armed 
camp. 

In  all  these  armies  nearly  all  the  more  brutal  and  dangerous 
work  falls  to  four  hundred  thousand  Cossacks.  They  are  loyal 
and  enthusiastic  killers,  and,  being  half  foreign,  they  are 
serviceable  in  massacring  Russians,  Letts,  or  Jews.  It  is  for 
this  reason  that  a  large  part  of  them  are  divided  into  small 
bands  and  kept  occupied  beating,  maiming,  and  killing  the 
rebellious  Russian  peasantry.  But  peasant  rebellions  have 
increased  recently  in  number  and  intensity  and  the  Cossacks 
have  become  insufficient.  As  there  are  no  more  Cossacks 
available,  a  large  number  being  occupied  on  the  Manchurian 
and  other  frontiers,  a  new  army,  called  the  "rural  guards," 
has  been  especially  created  for  this  part  of  the  governmental 
campaign. 

On  paper  the  Russian  army,  including  these  Cossacks,  consists 
at  the  present  time  of  some  two  million  men.  The  mutinies 
of  the  last  two  years  prove  that  few  of  this  army  except  the 
Cossacks  can  safely  be  coimted  on  for  service  in  the  present 
internal  war.  Several  himdred  thousand  of  the  common 
soldiers,  chiefly  former  workingmen,  woidd  even  turn  their  guns 
against  the  Government  if  they  could.  The  rest  —  more  than 
a  million  peasant  soldiers  of  the  line  —  are  clearly  a  neutral 
force.  They  have  not  the  organisation,  determination,  dash, 
or  physical  ability  to  create  a  successful  revolt.  In  case  they 
did  mutiny  they  would  probably  prove  helpless  against  the 
loyal  troops  that  are  carefully  mingled  with  them  in  every 
camp.  On  the  other  hand,  they  would  certainly  be  glad  to 
desert  the  ranks  at  the  first  opportunity  —  if  for  no  other  reason 
than  to  avoid  the  suffering  and  hardship  of  the  Russian  soldier's 
lite.  This  life  has  always  been  hard,  the  discipline  always 
severe,  and  since  the  revolution  conditions  are  worse  than  e^^er. 
For  the  suppression  of  agrarian  disorders,  then,  such  soldiers 
could  scarcely  avail.  An  irresistible  opportunity  for  individual 
desertion  would  be   afforded  the   moment  they   were   spread 


WAITING  FOR   CIVIL   WAR  263 

over  the  land  in  the  inevitable  small  detachments.  Moreover, 
they  have  nearly  all  now  taken  part  in  peasant  disturbances 
in  their  own  villages  before  they  were  torn  from  their  homes 
and  taken  to  the  barracks.  They  might  mutiny,  they  would 
probably  desert,  they  would  certainly  be  useless  in  an  agrarian 
uprising. 

The  Government  can  count  on  its  four  hundred  thousand 
Cossacks  and  on  some  one  hundred  thousand  other  troops  of 
favoured  regiments.  The  newly  formed  ** rural  guards,"  if  not 
very  valuable,  are  probably  loyal,  as  are  also  an  equal  number 
of  the  gendarmes  and  of  the  police.  Here  are  some  seven 
hundred  thousand  armed  and  disciplined  men.  •  Also  there  are 
some  fifty  thousand  loyal  army  officers  and  several  hundred 
thousand  rural  police,  spies,  ruffians  and  black  hundreds  which 
the  Government  has  armed  and  can  rely  on  where  the  warfare 
has  not  yet  entered  into  a  critical  guerilla  stage.  Altogether, 
then,  the  Government  has  at  its  disposal  a  million  armed  men. 

There  are  also  determined  partisans  of  the  Government 
without  arms  —  Government  officials  in  the  middle  and  higher 
ranks,  large  and  small  landlords,  the  merchants  of  the  towns, 
village  usurers  and  shopkeepers,  petty  traders  who  wish  to  get 
rid  of  their  business  rivals  among  the  Jews.  But,  as  the 
elections  have  finally  proven,  it  may  be  doubted  if  the  Govern- 
ment's unarmed  supporters  number,  all  told,  another    million. 

The  rest  of  the  people,  not  less  than  twenty-five  million 
fighting  men,  are  opposed  to  the  Government,  and  gradually  are 
joining  in  the  war  against  it.  They  are  fighting  men  because 
nearly  all  have  had  four  or  five  years  training  in  the  army, 
and  several  millions  have  been  through  the  recent  war.  They 
are  opposed  to  the  Government  because  the  Government  has 
taken  a  clear  and  final  stand  against  their  wishes  for  a  political 
and  economic  revolution,  as  expressed  in  the  first  Duma, 
and  is  using  the  most  violent,  savage,  and  murderous  means  to 
repress  their  discontent.  What  part  of  the  twenty-five  million 
are  already  prepared  to  go  to  war  —  i.  e.,  to  risk  their  lives 
for  the  cause  —  it  is  impossible  to  say.  Certainly  almost 
the  whole  youth  of  the  cities  and  towns,  probably  the  over- 
whelming majority  of  the  yoimg  peasants  as  well.  The  older 
men,  less  valuable  and  slower  to  act,  are  fast  moving  toward  the 


a64  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

same  attitude.  If  the  present  conditions  continue  there  is  no 
doubt  that  a  large  part  of  the  twenty-five  million  will  soon  be 
ready  for  the  revolution's  service. 

What  is  lacking  to  the  revolution  is  not  men  but  organisation 
and  means.  It  is  here  that  the  disparity  is  most  glaring.  The 
Government  gets  every  year  several  hundred  million  rubles 
from  foreign  financiers,  and  will  doubtless  continue  to  get  these 
sums  at  whatever  cost.  The  Government  has  control  of 
hundreds  of  forts  and  arsenals  throughout  the  land,  of  innum- 
erable rapid-firing  cannon  and  machine  guns.  It  monopolises 
the  use  of  the  telegraphs  and  railroad  lines,  and  will  continue 
to  monopolise  them  even  in  the  height  of  civil  war.  The 
revolutionists  can  always  destroy  the  railways  —  the  organisation 
to  use  them  is  lacking  and  must  remain  lacking  until  the 
Government  has  been  overthrown.  The  same  is  true  of  the 
telegraphs.  Even  when  all  the  lines  are  down,  the  Government 
will  continue  to  have  the  use  of  its  wireless  system  against 
the  revolution. 

The  Government  is  not  only  highly  organised,  but  it  is 
organised  especially  to  fight  the  revolution.  By  the  side  of  the 
first  Government,  a  second  has  grown  up.  There  is  one 
organisation  of  the  railroads  in  time  of  peace,  and  another 
organisation  in  time  of  insurrection.  In  time  of  insurrection 
the  roads  are  on  a  war  footing.  Every  workman  becomes  a 
soldier,  every  superintendent  an  officer.  So  with  the  telegraphs, 
the     post-office,     and    the     police.  Machine      guns       are 

within  a  few  minutes  of  every  public  place,  spies  infest  every 
restaurant  and  railway  station,  Cossacks  are  on  the  alert  for 
the  few  cents  of  extra  pay  they  get  for  every  hour  of  "service 
against  the  internal  enemy." 

Against  such  an  array  of  organisation  and  force  what  can 
the  people  do?  There  is  no  hidden  answer  to  the  question,  no 
possibility  of  an  easy  escape  from  the  colossal  tragedy  of  the 
situation.  The  people  must  be  ready  to  die.  When  they  are 
ready  to  make  the  necessary  sacrifices  of  life  and  everything 
that  life  contains,  then  only  can  they  hope  for  freedom-.  A 
quarter  of  a  million  soldiers  were  sacrificed  in  Japan.  This  is 
a  war  of  infinitely  more  importance  to  the  land. 

The  war  between  the  Czar  and  the  people  has  already  passed 


WAITING  FOR  CIVIL  WAR  265 

the  first  stages.  The  armies  have  taken  up  their  positions^ 
and  the  first  skirmishes,  in  which  the  Government  has  been 
tmiformly  successful,  have  already  occurred.  Nevertheless^ 
the  revolutionists  have  gained  a  great  advantage.  With  a 
mere  fraction  of  their  army  mobilised  and  in  the  field,  they 
are  keeping  busy  the  total  available  Government  force. 

How  many  men  of  fighting  age  are  subject  to  revolutionary 
orders  at  the  present  time?  Probably  two-thirds  of  the  city 
population,  most  of  the  miners  and  railway  men,  practically 
the  whole  people  of  the  Baltic  provinces  and  of  parts  of  the 
Caucasus,  and  a  few  hundred  thousand  Russian  peasants.  In 
all,  certainly  no  more  than  a  few  million  men  —  armed  with  a 
few  hundred  thousand  revolvers  and  less  than  a  hundred 
thousand  rifles,  financed  with  the  few  million  rubles  they  have 
been  able  to  seize  from  the  Government,  held  together  largely 
by  purely  local  organisations  and  limited  in  their  field  of  action 
to  a  fraction  of  the  land.  The  workingmen  are  able  to  gather 
in  mobs  of  several  hundred  or  several  thousand.  Without 
arms  they  cannot  be  able  to  do  much  active  damage,  though 
it  takes  several  large  armies  and  numerous  smaller  detachments 
to  keep  them  down.  The  guerilla  forces  in  the  Baltic  provinces, 
the  Caucasus  and  Poland,  are  composed  of  bands  of  only  ten  ta 
a  hundred  armed  men,  but  they  destroy  a  great  deal  of 
Government  property  and  keep  three  armies  employed. 

The  peasants'  contingents  are  only  beginning  to  move. 
The  whole  peasantry  is  daily  growing  more  bitter  against  the 
Government,  but  hardly  a  tithe  have  yet  become  soldiers  of 
the  revolution.  Nevertheless,  see  what  an  army  they  have 
engaged.  The  Cossacks  and  rural  guards  in  the  country  probably 
number  not  less  than  two  hundred  thousand  mounted  men. 
If  the  peasants*  revolt  continues  to  spread,  if  ever  the  dozen 
most  revolutionary  provinces  of  the  Volga  and  the  south  rise 
at  the  same  time,  this  force  would  not  be  a  fraction  of  what 
would  be  needed  to  keep  the  peasants  down.  It  is  at  this 
moment  of  the  peasants'  uprising  that  the  Railway  Union  has 
agreed  to  strike,  and  with  the  aid  of  the  peasants  to  destroy 
the  bridges  and  tear  up  the  ties.  The  national  movements 
in  Poland,  Finland,  the  Baltic  provinces  and  the  Caucasus, 
would  redouble  at  such  an  auspicious  revolt.     The  Czar's  loyal 


266  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

army  —  that  is,  the  part  which  is  loyal  —  would  do  well  if 
it  held  the  strong  places  and  a  few  important  lines  of  communi- 
cation. The  country  districts  would  have  practically  emanci- 
pated themselves  at  the  outset,  the  cities  would  soon  become 
centres  of  mutinies  and  barricades,  and  all  Russia  would  be 
covered  with  the  same  guerilla  warfare  that  has  been  waging 
for  the  year  past  on  the  borders  of  the  Black  and  Baltic  seas. 

It  may  well  be  a  protracted  struggle,  for  it  is  most  likely 
to  end  as  it  begins,  a  guerilla  war.  The  revolutionary  forces 
will  strive  for  better  organisation,  more  arms  and  more  financial 
backing  —  but  they  will  long  remain  relatively  disorganised 
and  poor  in  both  money  and  guns.  The  size  of  the  guerilla 
bands  may  increase  from  tens  to  hundreds,  or  even  thousands; 
it  will  certainly  be  long  before  anything  like  a  regular  army 
is  in  the  field.  The  basis  of  the  operations  of  these  bands  may 
spread  from  a  dozen  outlying  districts  to  a  large  section  of 
Russia  itself,  the  hundred  thousand  men  now  secretly  or  openly 
under  arms  may  increase  even  tenfold;  the  Government  will 
-continue  to  count  successfully  on  all,  or  a  very  large  part,  of  a 
centralised  army  of  nearly  a  million  men.  It  will  continue  to 
hold  for  a  long  time  nearly  all  the  strong  places,  the  cannon  and 
the  machine  guns;  the  wireless  telegraphs  will  remain;  the 
railway  soldiers  will  hold  and  operate  the  main  lines  and  repair 
them  sufficiently  at  least  for  the  transportation  of  troops. 

There  is  possibility  of  appalling  bloodshed.  No  people 
is  more  lavish  of  lives  than  a  peaceful  people  whipped  and 
driven  to  revolt.  If  the  Czar  is  determined,  no  man  can  see 
where  the  bloodshed  will  end.  In  our  Civil  War  the  United 
States,  a  nation  of  thirty  millions  fighting  over  the  freedom 
of  a  few  million  blacks,  and  the  preservation  of  the  Union,  lost 
a  million  men.  If  great  Russia,  fighting  over  the  freedom  of 
one  hundred  and  forty  million  human  beings  and  for  the  birth- 
right of  a  nation,  should  give  the  lives  of  a  million  or  several 
million,  could  we  fail  to  understand? 

It  is  certain  that  the  intelligence,  daring  and  fighting  powers 
displayed  in  any  of  the  great  revolutions  of  England,  France, 
or  America  would  not  have  been  sufficient  to  win  this  present 
struggle.  If  to  the  resources  of  the  tyrannical  governments 
in  all  past  cases  there  had  been  added  an  apparently  inexhaustible 


WAITING  FOR  CIVIL  WAR  267 

treasury,  military  railroads,  and  even  wireless  telegraphy,  these 
revolutions  might  have  taken  generations  where  they  took 
years  to  triumph.  We  must  remember  that  as  far  as  its  need 
of  the  machinery  of  war  to  fight  its  people  is  concerned,  the 
Russian  Government's  resources  are  inexhaustible;  for  France 
cannot  afford  to  let  Russia  be  without  a  modem  army.  And 
it  must  also  be  remembered  that  the  cannon,  machine  guns, 
railroads,  and  telegraphs  cannot  be  turned  against  their  owners, 
as  Westerners  so  superficially  imagine.  All  that  is  necessary 
to  protect  them  is  an  army  of  a  million  well  paid  and  well- 
drilled  mercenaries  —  and  these  Russia  has,  literally  a  profes- 
sional army,  such  as  is  supposed  not  to  exist  since  the  introduction 
of  universal  military  servitude. 

Americans  and  Europeans  would  do  well  to  take  an  interest 
in  the  new  Russian  military  slavery  by  which  a  modem 
professional  army  of  a  million  men  can  keep  down  twenty 
million.  If  the  method  succeeds,  it  will  first  be  imitated  by 
Prussia,  Hungary,  and  other  reactionary  countries,  and  later 
perhaps  by  their  more  Western  neighbours.  A  few  years  or 
decades  would  be  enough  to  endanger  all  the  liberty  there  is  on 
this  earth.  The  great  world-danger  of  Russia's  success  is,  it 
may  encourage  the  hope  of  the  privileged  classes  everywhere  to 
establish  similar  military  despotisms,  and  encourage  the  gradual 
growth  of  armies  making  the  establishment  of  such  despotisms 
possible. 


part  four 
Evolution  of  a  New  Nation 


CHAPTER  I 

THE    NATION    UNITED 

IN  STRUGGLING  against  Czarism  the  Russian  people  are 
fighting  for  the  right  of  free  development  in  every  possible 
direction.  The  professors  are  struggling  for  academic  freedom, 
the  peasants  for  land,  the  workingmen  for  the  right  to  organise, 
citizens  for  the  right  to  govern  themselves,  publicists  for  the 
right  to  speak  and  write,  and  the  people  at  large  for  every 
elementary  human  freedom.  As  a  result  there  are  as  many 
parties  as  there  are  groups  of  people  that  emphasise  one  or 
another  aspect  of  the  struggle;  but  it  by  no  means  follows  that 
these  parties  are  turning  aside  to  fight  one  another.  On  the 
contrary  there  is  no  fundamental  confusion.  The  object  of 
every  bona  fide  liberal,  radical,  or  revolutionary  organisation, 
is  to  take  all  the  power  away  from  the  incompetent,  immoral,, 
and  murderous  regime  that  is  at  present  in  control.  All  opposi- 
tional parties  are  agreed  that  the  Government  has  never  listened 
to  any  argument  except  that  of  violence ;  that  the  past  warfare 
of  the  people  against  the  Government,  whether  the  best  possible 
or  not,  has  been  entirely  natural  and  justifiable;  that  no  one 
but  the  Russian  people  itself  should  be  consulted  in  the  regenera- 
tion of  Russia ;  that  the  Duma  should  have  absolute  and  supreme 
power,  and  that  a  system  of  universal  suffrage  should  be  estab- 
lished by  which  the  common  people  shotdd  control  the  destiny 
of  the  nation.  In  the  words  of  Professor  Maxime  Kovalevsky, 
there  is  only  one  question  in  Russia  to-day,  that  is  whether 
Russia  is  to  be  a  European  or  an  Asiatic  nation. 

From  this  state  of  the  public  mind  some  kind  of  unity  is 
a  necessary  and  inevitable  consequence.  The  various  revolu- 
tionary and  oppositional  organisations  often  feel  bitterly  against 
one  another  for  what  they  consider  to  be  a  misinterpretation 
of  the  main  purpose  of  the  revolution,  or  a  dangerous  error 
in  the  others'  tactics.     Nevertheless  they  cooperate  practically 

271 


272  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

in  that  they  have  dropped  into  an  unconscious  and,  perhaps 
even  unwilHng,  but  nevertheless  perfectly  definite,  division  of 
labotir.  The  Liberals  or  Constitutional  Democrats  provided 
the  parliamentary  organisation  and  the  leading  parliamentary 
ideas;  the  Peasants'  Unions  and  the  Labour  Group  directed 
the  peasantry  into  politics;  the  Social  Democrats  organised 
the  workingmen;  the  Social  Revolutionists  are  most  actively 
occupied  with  preparations  for  insurrection. 

The  nation  was  first  united  at  the  time  of  the  great  general 
strike  which  brought  about  the  October  Manifesto.  Before 
the  Manifesto  there  were  only  two  organisations  which  could  be 
said  to  have  any  very  important  political  influence.  The 
first  was  the  congress  of  the  zemstvos,  or  local  government 
boards,  and  the  town  councils;  the  second  was  the  Union  of 
Unions,  which  included  organisations  of  all  the  professions  of 
Russia  and  of  nearly  all  their  leading  members.  Of  course  all 
these  local  government  bodies  are,  according  to  Russian  election 
laws,  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  richest,  most  privileged  and 
most  conservative  classes  alone.  It  happened,  however,  that 
their  power  was  so  restricted  by  the  Central  Government,  and 
their  functions  relatively  so  unimportant,  that  none  but  the 
enthusiastic  reformers  took  part  in  the  elections.  Therefore, 
although  at  least  nine-tenths  of  the  landlords  and  rich  citizens 
that  elect  these  bodies  are  ultra-conservative  and  entirely 
friendly  to  the  Government,  the  zemstvos  had  nearly  everywhere 
fallen  into  the  hands  of  honest  and  enthusiastic,  sometimes 
even  qtiite  serious  and  democratic,  reformers. 

The  congress  held  at  Moscow  on  the  6th  of  November,  1905, 
three  weeks  after  the  Manifesto  of  Freedom,  shows  the  temper 
of  the  organisation  at  this  time.  The  overwhelming  majority 
of  these  relatively  disinterested  reformers  voted  in  favour  of 
all  the  essential  features  of  the  revolutionary  proposals  that  were 
afterward  made  the  programme  of  the  whole  nation  in  the 
address  of  the  first  Duma  to  the  throne.  One  of  the  speakers, 
the  well-known  Roditchev,  the  only  important  public  character 
in  Russia  who  has  been  a  member  of  all  three  Dumas,  and  who 
was  also  perhaps  the  leading  orator  in  each,  demanded  that 
either  the  new  elections  should  be  general  and  direct  or  that  the 
proposed  Duma  should  not  be  convoked  at  all.     As  it  was  known 


THE    NATION    UNITED  273 

that  the  laws  then  being  framed  by  the  ministers  did  not  concede 
di^-ect  elections  this  was  a  challenge  and  ultimatum  to  the 
Government.  He  insisted  also  on  the  "absolute  separation 
of  the  Government  from  the  reactionary  court  party."  Prince 
Dolgorukov  said  that  they  ought  to  refuse  to  grant  the  Govern- 
ment any  credits.  Other  speakers  demanded  a  common  action 
with  the  extreme  revolutionary  parties.  One  said,  "Do  not 
fear  the  word  'revolution;'  we  are  also  revolutionaries,  at  least 
in  principle."  Another  said,  "I  am  not  a  Socialist,  but  if  any 
one  will  show  me  that  the  Socialists  will  save  Russia,  I  shall 
be  first  to  stretch  them  my  hand;  a  temporary  aUiance  is 
inevitable." 

It  was  decided  to  demand  an  absolute  amnesty  of  all  political 
and  religious  criminals,  and  at  the  same  time  the  pimishment 
of  all  officials  guilty  of  having  stirred  up  the  massacres  and 
other  disorders.  This  resolution  justifies  the  whole  movement 
against  the  Government  even  in  its  most  revolutionary  aspects, 
while  it  refuses  any  clemency  toward  officials  guilty  only  of 
having  carried  out  the  well-known  inclinations  of  the  Czar. 

It  is  v/orth  while  to  stop  and  notice  in  this  early  congress  the 
beginning  of  the  only  great  division  that  now  separates  the 
Russian  people.  The  more  peace-loving  and  less  aggressive 
members  of  the  congress  proposed,  instead  01  the  Duma  elected 
by  universal  and  equal  suffrage,  a  national  assembly  to  be 
composed  of  representatives  sent  by  local  government  boards, 
town  councils,  universities,  and  so  on,  and  suggested  that  this 
body  should  then  elaborate  the  new  electoral  law.  In  favour 
of  this  proposition  were  the  well-known  public  men  Prince 
Trubetzkoi,  General  Kousmin-Karavaiev  and  Stachovitch. 
Another  relatively  conservative  view  was  that  of  Maxime 
Kovalevsky,  who  said  that  he  was  not  an  anti-republican  but 
that  he  was  persuaded  that  the  peasants  did  not  yet  want  a 
republic,  and  therefore  that  although  in  France  he  might  be  a 
republican  in  Russia  he  was  a  monarchist.  Count  Heyden 
agreed  with  these  ideas. 

These  points  of  view  were  not  so  objectionable  as  those 
expressed  by  Alexander  Gutchkov,  who  has  now  become  the 
leader  of  the  third  Duma,  and  of  such  reformers  as  are  entirely 
friendly   with   the   present   Government.     Mr.   Gutchkov   was 


274  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

opposed  to  direct  suffrage  and  also  to  any  sort  of  alliance  with 
the  revolutionary  parties.  Finally,  Prince  Volkonsky,  now 
become  the  leader  of  the  notorious  black  hundreds,  demanded, 
though  without  receiving  any  approval,  that  the  congress  lend 
its  support  unconditionally  to  the  Government.  It  is  necessary 
to  note  in  passing  these  conservative  tendencies  of  the  minority 
of  the  congress,  for  since  the  revolutionary  movement  has 
stirred  up  the  land-owning  and  otherwise  privileged  electors 
the  recent  zemstvo  congresses  have  taken  a  position  somewhere 
between  that  of  Volkonsky  and  Gutchkov,  and  this  must  not 
appear  as  a  reaction  but  merely  as  an  assertion  of  neglected 
privileges  on  the  part  of  a  threatened  social  class. 

At  the  same  period  also  the  famous  Union  of  Unions  reached 
its  highest  degree  of  development.  This  organisation  had 
declared  its  support  of  the  first  general  strike,  and  later,  in  view 
of  a  possible  recurrence,  decided  to  assess  all  its  members  one 
day's  earnings  for  the  support  of  the  next  great  national  effort. 
Nearly  all  the  most  distinguished  engineers,  lawyers,  doctors, 
journalists,  artists,  actors,  and  authors  had  openly  joined  in 
the  movement.  Even  the  professors  and  school-teachers  were 
organised,  and  the  Railway  and  Peasants'  Unions  were  admitted 
to  membership.  Besides,  there  was  a  union  for  the  advance- 
ment of  the  interests  of  women,  and  the  Union  of  Hebrews, 
The  Hebrew  union  alone,  I  was  told  by  a  prominent  Jewish  editor, 
had  more  than  one  hundred  and  fifty  local  branches  and  fifty 
thousand  members. 

Here  is  the  heart  of  the  Union  of  Unions'  revolutionary 
declaration  on  the  eve  of  the  second  strike: 

The  Government  has  committed  many  new  crimes.  It  has  arrested 
the  Central  Bureau  of  the  Union  of  Peasants,  of  the  Union  of  the  Post 
and  Telegraphs,  also  the  Council  of  Deputies  of  the  Workingmen.  It 
has  closed  the  progressive  newspapers  and  proclaimed  laws  that  destroy 
civil  liberty.  The  Government  is  threatening  the  rights  which  the 
people  obtained  for  themselves  by  struggle,  and  which  it  confirmed 
(only)  by  the  Manifesto  of  October  17th.  The  liberty  of  the  people  is 
in  danger. 

The  Central  Bureau  and  Committee  of  the  Union  of  Unions,  declaring 
a  common  cause  with  the  Council  of  Workingmen 's  Deputies  in  its 
struggle  against  the  Government,  calls  upon  all  citizens  to  defend  their 
rights.  The  Government  invites  us  to  struggle;  then  let  us  struggle. 
The  form  of  this  struggle  does  not  depend  at  all  upon  us.      It  depends 


THE    NATION   UNITED  275 

upon  the  actions  of  the  Government,  which  by  its  invasions  is  trying  to 
destroy  the  organisation  of  the  working  people,  of  the  peasants  and  of 
the  revolutionary  professional  classes.  By  its  effort  it  is  compelling  the 
revolutionary  movement  to  take  an  elementary  road.  If  the  Govern- 
ment keeps  the  power  in  its  hands  it  threatens  innumerable  misfortunes 
and  bloodshed.  The  Central  Bureau  and  Committee  of  the  Union  of 
Unions  invites  all  the  unions  which  compose  it  to  commence  a  mobili- 
sation of  their  forces  to  be  ready  every  moment  to  take  part  in  the  general 
political  strike  as  soon  as  it  shall  be  proclaimed. 

The  Union  then  demands  the  abdication  of  the  "provocative  Govern- 
ment" and  the  immediate  convocation  of  a  constitutional  assembly. 

As  long  as  the  Government  allowed  it  to  remain  in  existence 
the  union  continued  its  revolutionary  activities.  On  the  3d  of 
May,  1906,  after  the  Government  had  secured  a  loan  of 
850,000,000  rubles  without  asking  the  Dimia's  consent,  the 
union  again  issued  an  equally  revolutionary  declaration  stating 
that  this  loan  permitted  the  Government  to  reply  to  the  popular 
demands  in  the  same  old  way,  by  bullets,  bayonets,  imprison- 
ment, and  exile: 

New  cannons,  new  machine  guns,  armoured  automobiles,  the  mobilisa- 
tion of  new  Cossack  regiments,  the  formation  of  new  troops  of  rural 
guards,  gendarmes,  and  secret  police— these  are  the  results  that  threaten 
us  from  this  new  financial  operation.  .  .  .  The  money  of  the  people 
will  be  employed  by  those  who  are  outraging  it,  our  children  will  be 
compelled  to  pay  for  our  enslavement. 

The  Union  of  Unions  declares  this  loan  a  crime  against  the  nation.  It 
declares  that,  contracted  illegally  without  the  consent  of  the  people,  this 
loan  cannot  bind  the  coming  popular  Government,  just  as  was  declared 
last  year  by  the  Peasants'  Union,  the  Council  of  Labour  Deputies  and  all 
the  Socialist  parties.    .    .     . 

But  the  effective  power  of  the  people  cannot  be  established  except  by 
a  constituent  assembly  possessing  full  constitution-making,  legislative, 
executive,  and  judicial  powers,  and  convoked  by  a  universal,  direct, 
secret,  and  equal  suffrage. 

When  we  have  had  a  glimpse  into  the  programme  of  these 
two  great  organisations,  the  Zemstvo  Congress  and  the  Union 
of  Unions,  we  have  all  the  materials  necessary  for  understanding 
the  origin  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic  party,  which  has 
occupied  the  principal  position  between  the  thoroughgoing 
revolutionists  and  the  Government.  The  party  so  formed 
is  indeed  in  a  sense  the  leading  political  party  of  Russia, 
as  we  can  readily  perceive  if  we  recall  the  fact  that  the  large 


276  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

majority  of  the  people,  hoping  little  from  politics  in  Russia, 
have  definitely  organised  themselves  —  when  at  all  —  rather 
into  revolutionary  organisations  than  into  political  parties. 

At  the  very  first  congress  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic 
Party,  in  October,  1905,  the  position  taken  was  thoroughly 
revolutionary.  Professor  Milyoukov's  opening  speech  declared 
that  the  end  of  the  party,  and  that  of  all  the  Russian  people, 
was  a  constituent  assembly  based  on  universal  and  equal  suffrage. 
He  declared  that  the  programme  of  his  party  was  not  only  radi- 
cal for  Russia  but  the  most  radical  of  any  similar  organisation 
in  all  Europe,  going  further  in  the  direction  of  the  decentrali- 
sation of  government  and  opposition  of  the  principle  of  laissez 
faire  than  any  of  the  rest.  While  his  party  wished  to  preserve 
the  integrity  of  the  Russian  State  as  well  as  the  inviolability 
of  private  property,  it  was  in  favour  of  giving  the  greatest 
possible  liberty  to  all  local  branches  of  the  Government,  and  of 
extending  the  functions  of  the  State  in  every  direction  that  for- 
warded the  common  good  rather  than  of  restricting  them 
according  to  the  principles  of  the  radicals  of  half  a  centiu-y  ago. 

Not  only  did  the  party  take  up  this  advanced  position  but 
it  looked  forward  to  a  strong  revolutionary  movement  and 
continued  to  do  so  for  a  year  or  more.  In  the  first  number  of  the 
party  paper,  edited  by  Professor  Milyoukov,  he  said:  "We  are 
for  the  revolution,  then,  in  so  far  as  it  serves  the  cause  of  politi- 
cal enfranchisement  and  social  reform."  This  was  not  an 
abstract  or  general  position  merely.  Professor  Milyoukov  wrote 
some  time  later  showing  that  he  was  prepared  for  great  dis- 
turbances. "The  disposition  of  the  country,"  he  said,  "has 
not  quieted  down;  it  has  only  gone  down  deeper  below  the 
surface  and  is  now  going  through  some  difficult  preparatory 
process  .  .  .  As  in  the  case  of  many  organisms,  the  greater 
the  interval  between  the  moment  of  irritation  on  the  surface 
and  the  final  discharge  of  nervous  energy,  the  more  grandiose 
the  latter  becomes."  Professor  Milyoukov  has  so  far  changed 
his  opinion  of  late  —  as  I  shall  show  in  the  following  chapter  — 
that  I  have  considered  it  necessary  to  indicate  definitely^  that 
he  stood  at  this  time  with  the  rest  of  the  Russian  nation. 

Indeed,  we  may  well  feel  that  the  Constitutional  Democratic 
leader  was  then  too  optimistic.     He  reported  an  interesting 


o  -5 
^  .2 

t-t      u 


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UMIVERSITY 


OF 


THE    NATION    UNITED  277 

interview  that  he  had  had  with  the  then  prime  minister,  Count 
Witte.  He  said  that  he  had  called  Count  Witte's  attention  to  the 
mistake  the  latter  (or  the  Czar)  had  made  in  not  responding  to 
the  general  wish  of  the  Russian  people  by  calling  a  constitutional 
assembly  and  bringing  about  a  liberal  but  monarchistic  consti- 
tution similar  to  that  of  Bulgaria  —  established,  by  the  way, 
with  the  aid  of  the  Russian  Government.  Count  Witte  answered 
that  the  public  would  now  be  satisfied  with  no  constitution 
that  was  given  from  above.  "  In  other  words,"  says  Milyoukov, 
"Count  Witte  proved  more  liberal  than  I."  Professor  Milyou- 
kov's  answer  was  that  the  public  would  not  be  satisfied  with 
a  constitution  from  above  only  because  it  did  not  believe  it  possi- 
ble to  get  it,  and  he  threatened  that  the  first  Duma  would  draw 
up  an  election  law,  demand  a  constitutional  assembly  elected 
on  the  basis  of  this  law,  and  that  only  after  this  would  a  third 
and  regular  legislative  body  be  convened.  Professor  Milyoukov, 
we  see,  from  the  very  outset  had  an  almost  child-like  faith  in 
the  powers  of  any  parliamentary  or  legislative  body  to  bring 
about  revolution  without  reference  to  the  guns  outside  its 
hall.  He  did  not  suspect  that  the  progressive  and  revolutionary 
elements  would  be  reduced  to  naught  either  by  the  election  law 
or  by  the  new  Duma  being  ignored  by  the  Government.  Count 
Witte  in  this  instance  was  the  true  statesman.  He  reckoned 
only  with  the  real  elements  of  the  situation,  the  revolutionary 
movement,  which  woiild  not  be  satisfied  with  any  constitution 
from  above,  and  was  undismayed  by  Milyoukov 's  threats  of 
paper  laws  to  be  passed  by  a  powerless  assembly. 

But  we  must  consider  that  even  Professor  Milyoukov  had 
small  faith  at  first  in  the  Duma.  He  wrote  a  little  later,  "  Until 
there  is  a  definite  admission  from  the  Government  that  a  con 
stitution  is  finally  established,  and  as  long  as  open  preparations 
for  a  coup  (Tdtat  continue,  it  will  be  impossible  to  squeeze  the 
revolutionary  struggle  into  the  framework  of  parliamentary 
combat.  We  are  under  no  delusion  about  this  and  do  not 
imagine  that  the  weapons  of  parliamentary  struggle  are  very 
great."  Since  the  Government  has  now  definitely  refused  to 
consider  that  there  is  a  constitution,  and  the  coup  d'etat  Mil- 
youkov feared  has  actually  taken  place,  we  must  conclude  from 
his  own  logic  that  the  weapons  of  parliamentary  struggle  have 


2  78  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

become  insignificant,  no  matter  what  Professor  Milyoukov 
may  now  say  to  the  contrary.  If  Professor  Milyoukov  and 
the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party  have  become  more  con- 
servative, this  is  doubtless  largely  due  to  the  fact  that,  instead 
of  seeing  that  both  parliamentary  and  extra-parliamentary 
revolutionary  movements  in  Russia  have  no  immediate  outlook, 
he  was  disposed  to  be  pessimistic  only  concerning  the  latter 
phase  of  the  great  movement. 

Before  the  first  Duma  the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party 
decided  that  they  were  actually  to  enter  into  the  details  of 
social  reform  rather  than  to  continue  a  direct  effort  for  a  funda- 
mental political  change;  they  were  already  on  a  downward 
slope  which  could  not  but  lead  to  the  miserable  fiasco  later 
to  be  mentioned.  But  they  had  not  yet  deserted  the  Emanci- 
pation movement,  and  so  we  can  speak  of  the  unity  of  the 
whole  Russian  people  in  the  first  Duma. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  NATION  CHOOSES  THE  REVOLUTIONARY  WAY 

THE  address  of  the  first  Duma  to  the  throne  was  signed 
by  all  its  members  except  an  insignificant  minority  of 
seven.  In  this  address  the  Russian  nation  presented  to  the 
Government  and  the  world  its  Magna  Charta.  It  was  passed 
unanimously.  While  the  seven  extreme  reactionaries  did  not 
vote  for  it  they  did  not  dare  to  vote  against  it,  but  merely 
walked  out  of  the  hall  as  if  they  did  not  know  what  had  been 
passed.  In  the  voting  on  every  important  question  proposed 
in  that  address  the  majorities  were  overwhelming.  Sometimes 
the  vote  was  unanimous,  sometimes  the  majorities  were  four 
hundred  to  one,  to  three,  five,  or  six.  This  unity  was  secured 
not  only  by  the  powerful  pressure  and  intelligence  of  the  Consti- 
tutional Democrats  who  occupied  the  centre,  but  by  the  full 
recognition  of  the  necessity  of  unity  by  both  of  the  extremes. 
After  the  Duma  was  dissolved  both  the  revolutionary  and  the 
peaceful  extremists  in  the  Duma  were  more  than  ever  impressed 
with  the  necessity  of  making  the  great  fight  on  the  basis  of  the 
address  to  the  throne.  Whatever  agitation  and  discussion  of 
other  revolutionary  subjects  may  have  been  in  the  air,  all  the 
wise  leaders  of  every  oppositional  and  revolutionary  party 
were  at  one  in  the  necessity  of  concentration  on  this  basis.* 

The  most  important  article  in  the  address,  the  matter  that 
came  first  of  all  before  the  Duma,  was  the  demand  for  imme- 
diate and  full  political  amnesty  as  "the  first  pledge  of  mutual 
imderstanding  and  mutual  agreement  between  the  Czar  and 
his  people."  This  demand  for  amnesty  is  a  demand  for  the 
most  revolutionary  measure  practicable  imder  the  present 
conditions  of  the  coimtry.  Few  of  the  himdreds  of  thousands 
of  political  prisoners  are  terrorised  by  their  political  punish- 
ments.    The  idea  that  people  can  be  forced  into  submission  by 

*  For  the  text  of  the  address  to  the  throne,  see  Appendix,  Note  B. 

279 


28o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

sheer  terror  comes  down  from  the  days  of  Ivan  the  Terrible  and 
is  utterly  inapplicable  at  the  present  time.  The  Duma  knew 
that  when  these  political  prisoners  got  out  they  would  first 
look  about  to  see  if  the  Government  was  itself  making  a  funda- 
mental and  revolutionary  reform.  If  not,  the  revolutionary 
movement  would  be  wondrously  reinvigourated  by  these  out- 
raged subjects.  Indeed  the  Duma  felt  that  the  revolutionary 
movement  would  become  invincible  when  reinforced  by  a  hundred 
thousand  active  recruits.  The  Dtmia  likewise  demanded  the 
abolition  of  martial  law,  knowing  well  that  this  would  leave 
entire  provinces,  and  perhaps  the  larger  part  of  the  coimtry, 
entirely  in  the  people's  hands. 

The  first  Duma  demanded  universal  suffrage,  the  respon- 
sibility of  the  ministers  and  all  the  Czar's  officials  to  the  Duma 
and  not  to  the  Czar,  the  abolition  of  the  existing  Coimcil  of 
State,  and  all  laws  that  stood  in  the  way  of  the  full  popular 
sovereignty.  In  a  word,  the  representatives  of  the  Russian 
nation  demanded  the  full  sovereignty  of  the  people,  and, 
whether  monarchy  or  republic,  a  wholly  democratic  state.  At 
the  same  time  the  Duma  was  very  well  aware  that  it  was  most 
unlikely  the  present  Czar  would  grant  this  request  for  a  com- 
paratively free  government,  and  it  knew  full  well  that  the 
demand  itself  was   leading   to   future  revolutionary  conflicts. 

Quite  as  revolutionary  as  its  political  programme  was  the 
Dimias's  challenge  to  the  reigning  landlord  caste.  In  demanding 
the  expropriation  of  the  estates  of  the  large  proprietors  on  the 
principle  of  eminent  domain,  the  Duma  was  instituting  a  social 
conflict  of  the  greatest  importance.  It  was  facing  the  funda- 
mental social  question  in  Russia,  for,  besides  the  Government, 
the  common  enemy  of  the  nation  is  the  landlord  class.  In 
taking  this  position  the  Duma  was  only  fulfilling  the  mandates 
on  which  it  had  been  elected,  for  all  over  the  country  the  voters 
had  united  definitely  against  the  landlords  as  well  as  against 
the  Government.  All  the  calamities  that  have  happened  since 
the  nation's  declaration  of  war  against  the  landlords,  have 
been  traced  by  the  Constitutional  Democratic  leaders  themselves 
to  a  conspiracy  between  the  Government  and  the  Russian  land- 
owning nobility  to  restore  fully  the  old  oppressive  despotism. 

The  Constitutional  Democrats  not  only  took  up  a  revolu- 


NATION  CHOOSES  REVOLUTIONARY  WAY       281 

tionary  position  with  the  rest  of  the  nation  at  the  beginning 
of  the  Duma;  they  maintained  it  in  a  sense  until  the  close.  The 
Duma's  action,  which  was  used  by  the  Government  as  an  excuse 
for  closing  it,  was  animated  by  the  same  revolutionary  spirit 
as  the  address  to  the  throne.  The  Duma  proposed  to  post  in 
every  village  in  the  country  declarations  to  the  effect  that  it 
intended  to  provide  all  the  peasants  with  land.  Although  the 
proposal  itself  is  entirely  practical  and  on  its  surface  innocent,, 
its  bearings  can  be  well  imagined.  Neither  the  Government  nor 
any  considerable  part  of  the  landlords  were  ever  willing  to 
carry  out  such  a  fundamental  social  reform,  and  to  do  it  against 
the  will  of  the  Czar  and  the  ruling  social  caste  meant  nothing 
less  than  social  revolution. 

No  sooner  were  the  troops  stationed  around  the  Dimia  hall 
for  the  purpose  of  expelling  the  deputies  than  active  members 
both  of  the  peasants'  and  the  Constitutional  Democratic  parties 
arranged  to  get  a  majority  of  the  members  then  present 
in  St.  Petersburg  to  meet  together  at  the  Viborg  in  Finland, 
where  they  issued  the  now  famous  manifesto.  In  this  historic 
document,  signed  by  more  than  two  hundred  representatives 
of  the  people,  it  was  predicted  that  the  Government  would  use 
every  effort  to  obtain  a  second  and  more  servile  Duma,  and  that 
if  it  succeeded  "in  suppressing  the  people's  movement  altogether 
it  would  summon  no  other  Duma  at  all."  As  is  usual  with 
political  predictions  this  one  turned  out  to  be  true  only  in  a 
very  large  interpretation.  Before  calling  an  obedient  and 
servile  Duma  the  Government  again  made  an  experiment  with 
the  old  Duma  election  law,  and  in  spite  of  all  the  efforts  of 
the  police  the  second  Duma  was  more  Socialist  and  more  revolu- 
tionary than  the  first.  But  the  prediction  held  strictly  true  for 
the  third  Duma,  the  elections  for  which  were  held  after  all 
only  thirteen  months  after  the  Viborg  manifesto.  When,  after 
deciding  to  dissolve  the  second  Duma  also,  the  Government 
had  succeeded  in  suppressing  the  people's  movement  altogether,, 
it  did  indeed  summon  no  other  Dimia,  if  we  use  the 
word  "Duma"  in  the  sense  in  which  it  was  employed  by  the 
signers  of  the  manifesto.  For  the  third  Duma  is  no  Duma  at 
all,  but  merely  a  council  of  elected  representatives  chosen  not 
by  the  people  but  to  suit  the  Government's  convenience. 


282  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  chief  revolutionary  proposal  of  the  Viborg  manifesto 
was  that  the  Government  had  no  right  to  demand  taxes  or 
recruits  from  the  people  without  the  consent  of  their  represen- 
tatives. As  there  was  no  such  clause  in  the  so-called  consti- 
tution or  in  fundamental  laws  in  existence  at  that  time,  this 
principle,  however  just,  was  entirely  extra-constitutional  and 
revolutionary.  The  manifesto  also  proclaimed  that  all  loans 
raised  without  its  consent  would  be  illegal.  That  all  three  of 
these  revolutionary  proposals  were  belated  and  impractical, 
that  the  country  was  no  longer  in  a  revolutionary  fever  as  at  the 
time  of  the  successful  general  strike  a  year  before,  is  not  of 
interest  at  this  point.  I  insist  only  that  these  measures  were 
thoroughly  unconstitutional  and  revolutionary,  being  the  same 
which  had  been  demanded  more  than  a  year  before  by  the 
Peasants'  Union,  the  Railway  Union,  the  Council  of  Labour  Depu- 
ties and  the  Socialist  parties  —  and  which  were  then  opposed 
by  the  timid  Constitutionalists,  at  the  only  time  when  they  had 
any  chance  of  practical  effect.  During  the  Dvuna  the  Consti- 
tutional Democrats  had  been  continually  forced  in  a  revolutionary 
direction,  or  at  least  held  in  a  radical  position,  by  the  so-called 
"Labour  Group,"  an  offshoot  of  the  Peasants'  Union.  At  its 
•close  they  fell  almost  entirely  into  the  revolutionary  position 
and  the  tactics  elaborated  more  than  a  year  before  by  that 
and  other  related  organisations. 

Among  the  signers  of  the  Viborg  manifesto  were  nearly  aU 
the  important  members  of  the  Duma,  the  only  exceptions  being 
several  leaders  who  were  attending  the  inter-parliamentary 
congress  in  London,  and  a  few  conservatives  like  Hey  den  and 
Stachovitch.  The  parties  that  stood  for  the  manifesto  had 
much  greater  success  than  ever  in  the  elections  for  the  second 
Duma.  The  only  regret  expressed  among  the  mass  of  the  elec- 
tors was  that  the  meeting  could  not  have  been  held  in  St.  Peters- 
burg and  that  the  Dimia  did  not  then  and  there  declare  itself 
the  Russian  Government.  Such  an  attempt  would  undoubtedly 
have  led  to  the  immediate  arrest  of  the  whole  Duma.  This 
would  have  had  a  much  more  electrical  effect,  would  have  been 
much  more  likely  to  precipitate  an  uprising  of  the  whole  nation 
than  the  passive-resistance  measure  actually  adopted  which 
called  on  the  people  to  refuse  recruits  and  the  payment  of  taxes. 


NATION  CHOOSES  REVOLUTIONARY  WAY       283 

Moreover,  these  members  of  the  Dimia  did  not  save  them- 
selves by  not  inviting  their  own  arrest  at  this  time,  when  it  would 
have  brought  on  not  only  a  powerful  movement  in  Russia 
but  a  great  wave  of  international  indignation  such  as  has  not 
been  seen  since  the  days  of  the  January  massacre  in  St.  Peters- 
burg —  for  they  have  all  just  been  on  trial  and  have  been 
sentenced  to  three  months'  imprisonment  by  the  courts. 

In  this  trial  Muromzev,  president  of  the  first  Duma,  asked 
how  it  could  be  possible  that  the  people's  elected  representatives, 
and  so  the  people  themselves,  should  be  declared  to  be  enemies 
of  the  Government,  and  he  claimed  that  such  a  view  sets  us  back 
in  the  Middle  Ages  when  the  governments  behaved  toward  the 
people  as  the  conquerors  in  a  conquered  land.  He  asked: 
"Can  we  look  on  our  people  in  this  way?  It  is  said  that  this 
is  the  patriotic  standpoint,  but  this  is  not  so;  it  is  rather  a 
standpoint  of  hostiUty  to  the  very  idea  of  the  State." 

We  see  that  in  the  intervening  two  years  the  president  of 
the  Duma  has  not  retracted  his  former  principles,  and  we  find 
that  the  revolutionary  spirit  of  the  workingmen  and  peasant 
deputies  had  on  the  contrary  rather  increased  than  fallen  dtiring 
this  period.  As  there  were  only  two  of  the  most  extreme  revo- 
lutionary party  among  the  peasants'  deputies  in  the  first  Dtmia 
and  forty  were  sent  to  the  second,  we  can  see  to  what  degree 
the  revolutionary  feeling  had  risen  between  the  two  Dumas. 
The  trial  of  the  Viborg  deputies  is  indeed,  as  the  lawyers  claimed, 
not  a  trial  of  individuals  but  of  the  whole  Russian  people.  The 
Russian  Government,  by  its  decision  in  this  trial,  has  convicted 
90  per  cent,  of  the  Russian  people  of  political  crime  and  sent 
their  representatives  to  prison  as  a  pimishment. 

That  the  signers  of  this  manifesto  deserved  well  of  the  Russian 
people  is  witnessed  also  by  the  attack  made  on  them  by  the 
reactionary  leaders.  The  Russian  Flag,  the  extreme  reac- 
tionary organ  favoured  by  a  large  class  of  officials  and  courtiers, 
demands  for  Muromzev,  the  president,  and  for  the  Princes 
Dolgorukov  and  Schackovskoi,  the  vice-presidents  of  the  Duma, 
the  death  .-penalty,  or,  what  is  even  worse,  a  life-long  sentence 
of  forced  labour  in  the  mines. 

We  must  distinguish  the  action  of  the  moderate  Constitutional 
Democratic   majority   in  this   Duma   from   the   action   of  the 


284  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

radical  minority.  The  majority  of  the  Duma  represented  at 
the  most  a  few  hundred  thousand  city  electors  and  small  land- 
owners, while  the  Labour  Group  represented  no  less  than  five 
or  ten  million  peasants.  This  group,  after  having  signed  the 
manifesto  calling  for  passive  resistance,  went  much  further 
in  its  appeal  to  the  population  and  called  on  them  to  enter  into 
real  revolution, ' '  open  violent  rebellion. ' '    Its  manifesto  declared: 

Nobody  has  a  right  to  submit  to  such  a  government,  it  would  be 
criminal  to  execute  its  decrees.  The  people  ought  everywhere  to  drive 
away  the  local  authorities  and  replace  them  by  elected  authorities. 
They  ought  to  confiscate  everywhere  and  place  in  the  hands  of  authorities 
legally  elected  by  the  nation,  all  the  fixed  and  movable  property  of  the 
State.     .     .     . 

The  peasants  ought  to  take  their  affairs  in  their  own  hands.  They 
have  not  been  given  land  and  liberty.  They  must  take  liberty;  they 
must  take  all  the  land,  not  in  a  disorderly  manner,  but  by  putting  it 
from  the  outset  into  the  hands  of  locally-elected  authorities 
Now  is  the  moment  for  the  whole  country  to  rise  as  a  single  man  to  save 
the  fatherland  from  ruin,  and  to  pronounce  the  terrible  judgment  of  the 
people  against  the  betrayers  of  the  country. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  immediate  practical  results  this 
appeal  was  no  more  efficient  than  the  call  of  the  Duma  majority 
for  passive  resistance,  but  it  had  a  far  more  revolutionary  and 
permanent  effect  on  the  people,  as  I  have  already  indicated 
in  speaking  of  the  state  of  mind  of  the  peasantry.  The  signers 
of  this  proclamation  were,  however,  quite  mistaken  as  to  the 
ripeness  of  the  country  for  a  great  revolutionary  movement. 
There  has  been  a  tremendous  evolution  in  this  direction,  but 
the  people  were  by  no  means  aroused  to  that  pitch  of  warlike 
spirit  and  readiness  for  martyrdom  that  would  be  necessary  to 
overthrow  a  government  having  such  financial  and  military 
resources  as  that  of  the  Czar. 

The  revolutionary  spirit  of  the  first  Duma  lived  not  only  in 
the  largely  increased  number  of  Socialist  and  revolutionary 
deputies  elected  to  the  second  —  nearly  one-half  of  the  whole 
body  in  spite  of  the  outrageous  election  law  and  the  monstrous 
interference  of  the  police — but  also  in  a  frequent  reassumption 
by  the  moderate  party  of  the  revolutionary  position  it  had 
taken  in  the  first  Duma.  When  this  Duma  also  had  made 
itself  obnoxious  to  the  Government  and  Nicholas  dissolved  it 


;=) 

H 

^  13 


NATION  CHOOSES  REVOLUTIONARY  WAY      285 

in  a  manifesto  creating  an  even  more  outrageous  election  law, 
he  specified  certain  accusations  of  political  crime.  From  the 
standpoint  of  one  wishing  to  preserve  all  his  arbitrary  power, 
these  accusations  were  certainly  justified.  It  was  true,  as 
Nicholas  claimed,  that  the  Duma  in  refusing  to  endorse  certain 
measures  of  the  Government  was  unquestionably  encouraging 
the  revolutionary  movement.  The  Government  asked  for  a 
law  punishing  the  justification,  in  meetings  and  in  the  press, 
of  so-called  political  "crimes."  The  Duma  refused  its  consent. 
The  Government  proposed  a  law  punishing  more  severely 
revolutionary  agitation  in  the  army.  The  Duma  refused  its 
consent  on  the  ground  that  such  agitation  could  only  be  fought, 
not  by  more  severe  punishment  than  that  in  existence,  but  by 
far-reaching  social  reforms.  The  Czar  accused  the  Duma  of 
having  allowed  a  minority  (the  two  hundred  Socialist  or  semi- 
Socialist  deputies,  a  pretty  large  minority)  of  using  the  Duma's 
right  of  questioning  the  Government  as  "  a  means  of  waging  war 
against  it  and  awaking  the  mistrust  of  the  population."  There 
can  be  no  question  that  this  accusation  was  practically  true. 
Finally,  the  Government  accused  the  Duma  of  not  having 
examined  the  budget  after  a  session  of  two  months,  and  suggests 
rightly  that  this  action  was  due  to  the  non-Russian  elements 
in  the  Duma  in  league  with  the  revolutionists.  It  is  true  that 
the  Polish  delegates  who  held  the  balance  of  power  were  consider- 
ing the  refusal  of  the  budget  on  the  ground  that  the  Govern- 
ment was  continuing  its  oppression  of  the  Polish  people.  It  is 
also  true  that  the  Mohammedan  group  was  probably  more  in 
accord  with  the  moderate  Socialists  than  with  the  Constitutional 
Democrats,  and  that  by  the  union  of  these  forces  a  majority 
entirely  hostile  to  the  Government  on  the  all-important  land 
question  might  have  been  created  had  the  Duma  continued. 

The  second  Duma,  then,  was  more  revolutionary  than  the 
first,  in  spite  of  efforts  of  the  moderate  Constitutional  Demo- 
crats to  prevent  its  drift  in  the  revolutionary  direction.  On 
all  great  economic  and  political  questions  the  Constitutional 
Democrats  in  the  Duma  were  disposed  to  compromise  indefi- 
nitely with  the  Government,  but  on  the  most  pressing  and 
immediate  questions  they  were  forced  by  the  overwhelming 
sentiment  of  the  country  to  take  up  a  revolutionary  position. 


286  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Indeed  the  position  that  they  took  at  this  time  in  refusing  ta 
pass  a  resolution  condemning  the  assassination  of  officials, 
without  reference  to  the  arbitrary  and  equally  violent  acts  of 
the  Government,  is  the  one  thing  which  will  never  be  forgiven 
them  by  the  reactionary  forces  of  the  country.  It  will  be 
difficult  for  the  most  conservative  members  of  the  party  to  over- 
come this  revolutionary  past,  and  above  all  it  will  be  difficult, 
if  not  impossible,  for  them  to  entirely  reverse  the  party's  position 
on  this  question  of  "The  Terror." 

The  practical  unity  of  the  Russian  people  in  favour  of  the 
revolutionary  movement  and  against  the  Government  was 
maintained,  then,  until  the  dissolution  of  the  second  Duma, 
when  the  Czar's  coup  d*^tat  practically  put  an  end  to  every 
shadow  of  constitutional  and  parliamentary  government. 


CHAPTER   III 

THE    UNITY    DESTROYED 

WE  HAVE  now  to  deal  with  the  only  serious  division 
that  has  taken  place  in  the  ranks  of  the  people  since 
the  beginning  of  the  Russian  revolution.  It  is  by  no  means  as 
important  a  division  as  it  appears,  but  owing  to  the  fact  that 
the  Constitutional  Democratic  party,  favoured  by  an  absurdly 
unjust  election  law  which  they  themselves  have  denounced^ 
formed  the  majority  of  the  first  Duma  and  usually  held  the 
balance  of  power  in  the  second,  this  division  has  become  noised 
abroad  and  is  overestimated  by  even  the  most  serious  foreign 
observers.  There  is  no  question  that  the  Constitutional 
Democratic  party  after  the  dissolution  of  the  second  Duma 
had  lost  almost  all  of  its  revolutionary  standpoint,  and 
become  an  ordinary  radical  party.  Such  parties  are  vitally 
important  and  entirely  justifiable  in  all  countries  that  have 
any  real  constitutional  government.  It  may  be  doubted, 
however,  if  this  kind  of  opposition  has  any  deep  signifi- 
cance whatever,  under  the  arbitrary  government  of  the  Russia 
of  to-day. 

That  a  group  so  timid  and  weak  as  to  assume  this  moderate 
position  during  the  present  great  crisis,  has  left  the  revolution- 
ary ranks  does  not  necessarily  mean  a  weakening  of  the  whole 
revolutionary  movement.  Quite  the  contrary.  It  means 
that  the  new  army,  composed  only  of  such  elements  as  are 
ready  to  fight  the  Government  by  all  means  until  it  is  entirely 
overthrown,  is  more  practically  constituted,  more  profound 
in  its  principles,  and  much  more  powerful  in  every  way.  The 
Constitutional  Democratic  party  has  withdrawn  from  the 
revolutionary  movement  only  a  small  minority  of  the  middle 
class.  The  majority  of  the  middle  class,  the  overwhelming 
majority  of  the  one  hundred  and  forty  million  peasants  and 
working  people,  remain  as  they  were  before,  united  in  the  move- 

2i^ 


,^88  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

ment  for  a  constitutional  assembly  and  the  absolute  sovereignty 
of  the  people. 

Nevertheless,  this  desertion  of  the  official  Constitutional 
Democratic  party  (let  it  be  noted  from  the  outset  that  the 
rank  and  file  of  those  who  have  voted  for  the  party  have  by  no 
means  forsaken  the  revolution),  since  it  is  the  first  and  only 
great  betrayal  since  the  beginning  of  the  movement,  is  the  only 
spiritual  calamity  that  has  happened  to  the  revolutionary 
movement.  Though  the  loss  was  only  of  one  part  of ^  one  of 
the  several  corps  of  the  great  revolutionary  army,  yet  the  loss 
did  destroy  the  complete  national  unity  that  existed  during  the 
first  Duma  when  all  elements  of  the  Russian  population  were 
as  one  against  the  Czar,  the  nobility  and  their  bought  retainers 
and  mercenaries. 

We  must  examine  this  desertion  carefully  to  find  out  whether, 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  conservative  wing  of  the  Russian 
moderate  party,  there  are  any  fundamental  defects  in  the 
morality  or  the  intelligence  of  the  revolutionary  movement. 
From  the  outset  the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party  was  an 
opportunist  and  political  organisation.  It  was  not  endeavour- 
ing, like  the  Socialist  parties,  to  unite  the  people  on  fundamental 
principles  of  social  evolution;  it  did  not  endeavour,  like  the 
Peasants'  Union  or  the  Council  of  Labour  Deputies,  to  bring 
together  large  elements  of  the  population  on  the  sole  ground 
of  their  economical  interests.  It  was  a  political  party  in  the 
same  sense  as  those  of  England  or  the  United  States,  where 
political  liberty  has  already  been  attained. 

Nevertheless  this  party  differed  from  similar  parties  in  other 
•countries.  At  the  time  of  its  formation  it  was  impossible,  and 
remains  impossible  to-day,  to  organise  any  large  party  in 
Russia,  even  if  it  is  to  have  only  one  hundred  thousand  members, 
without  taking  in  revolutionary  and  Socialistic  elements.  In 
the  first  congress  of  the  party  Professor  Milyoukov,  the 
president,  stated  that  the  party  was  composed  of  persons  with 
two  opinions  in  regard  to  the  Socialist  proposals  —  one  class 
which  were  convinced  that  these  principles  were  just  but  that 
they  were  outside  the  limits  of  practical  politics,  another  that 
considered  them  unacceptable  in  general.  Therefore,  he  urged 
that  it  was  necessary  for  the  party  to  take  no  position  on  these 


THE    UNITY    DESTROYED  289 

fundamental  social  principles.  "To  put  these  questions  in  the 
foreground,"  he  said,  "and  to  include  them  in  our  programme, 
will  have  as  an  immediate  result  the  dissolution  of  the  party." 
We  see  then,  not  that  the  party  was  conservative,  since  it  wished 
to  take  into  its  ranks  a  large  number  of  convinced  Socialists, 
but  that  it  was  opportunist.  The  leader,  Milyoukov,  was  a 
confessed  opportunist.  The  party  executive,  largely  composed 
of  members  of  the  first  Duma,  was  half  opportunistic.  The 
party  members,  on  the  other  hand,  were  from  the  outset 
extremely  radical  and  Socialistic  if  not  Socialist.  One  may  say 
without  danger  of  error  that  a  very  large  proportion  of  them 
were  "opportunist  Socialists"  and  far  more  friendly  to  the 
Socialist  parties  than  to  organisations  more  conservative  than 
their  own.  When  we  come  to  those  who  gave  their  votes  for 
this  party,  a  much  larger  and  more  important  body  than  the 
party  members,  we  find  a  still  more  Socialistic  and  revolutionary 
opinion.  In  each  election  a  very  large  portion  voted  for  the 
Constitutional  Democratic  Party  only  because  there  was  no 
other  organisation  between  this  party  and  the  Socialists. 

The  party  organisation  itself  has  ceased  to  be  revolutionary, 
but  this  change  could  hardly  have  come  about  except  for  the 
persecution  of  the  Government.  A  large  part  of  the  radical 
members  of  all  the  committees  have  been  arrested  all  over 
the  country,  leaving  inevitably  only  the  most  conservative 
which  the  Government  either  could  not  or  did  not  care  to  disturb. 
For  instance,  the  radical  members  of  the  first  Duma  were 
disqualified  by  the  Government  for  election  to  the  second. 
As  a  result  many  of  the  new  representatives  came  from  the 
conservative  wing  of  the  party.  Again  and  again  the 
Government  has  been  able  to  change  the  whole  tactics  of  this 
party,  which  has  insisted  always  on  being  strictly  legal,  by  orders 
issued  directly  from  the  Government  bureaus.  Whenever 
anything  the  party  was  doing  seemed  especially  radical  to  the 
Government,  it  proceeded  to  enact  some  new  administrative 
regulation  by  which  the  agitation  was  eradicated.  The  party 
insisted  on  being  legai.  Is  it  necessary  to  expatiate  on  the 
absurdity  of  legaUty  in  the  Russia  of  to-day?  Step  by  step,  as 
the  Government  has  become  more  severe  in  its  measures,  the 
"legal"  party  has  been  forced  backward. 


290  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Tainted  with  the  vice  of  opportunism  rather  than  that 
of  conservatism,  the  party  at  the  meeting  of  the  second  Duma 
seemed  about  to  change  its  tactics  once  more  and  to  adopt  a 
more  revolutionary  rather  than  a  more  conservative  position. 
During  the  second  elections,  and  before  the  Duma  met,  it 
appeared  that  the  Socialists  would  very  nearly  have  a  majority 
without  the  Constitutional  Democrats,  and  Professor  Milyoukov 
said  in  a  public  interview  that  the  party  would  have  to  work 
with  these  elements.  But  when  the  Duma  met  it  was  soon 
clear  that  the  aggressive  tactics  of  the  Socialists  against  the 
Government  might  lead  to  an  immediate  dissolution.  Now 
as  a  purely  opportunist  and  purely  political  party,  the  Consti- 
tutional Democrats  were  of  practically  no  importance  except 
by  the  Duma  being  in  session.  They  were  therefore  forced  into 
every  possible  measure  for  conciliating  the  Government  and, 
preventing  the  dissolution.  They  dropped  all  the  revolutionary 
proposals  addressed  to  the  throne  by  the  first  Duma,  postponed 
the  demand  for  amnesty  and  declared  through  their  leaders, 
Hessen  and  Milyoukov,  that  they  were  ready  to  compromise 
even  on  the  absolutely  vital  matters  of  obtaining  a  just  election 
law  and  expropriating  the  landlords  for  the  benefit  of  the 
peasants.  But  this  timid  and  conciliatory  attitude,  instead  of 
bringing  the  Government  to  yield  to  their  attenuated  proposals, 
only  made  easier  the  Government's  design  of  abolishing  the 
parliamentary  institution  at  least  in  all  but  name. 

When  the  Czar  dissolved  the  second  Duma,  and  at  the  same 
time  broke  his  own  word  and  repealed  a  "fundamental  law," 
he  performed,  according  to  the  Constitutional  Democrats,  an 
unconstitutional  act.  In  pursuance  of  their  own  principles,  and 
concentrating  all  their  strength  in  a  fight  for  the  constitution, 
they  should  have  done  everything  in  their  power  to  resist  this 
measure.  All  the  organs  and  speakers  of  the  party  should  have 
proclaimed,  without  cessation  or  fear  of  any  punishment,  the 
unconstitutionality  of  this  act.  Being  unconstitutional  it  was 
also  a  political  crime.  By  proclaiming  this  act  a  crime  of  the 
Czar,  all  the  well-known  leaders  of  their  party  could  have  got 
themselves  imprisoned  or  exiled,  and  thus  have  created  the 
utmost  possible  protest  against  this  measure  — which,  according 
to  their  principles,  was  the  worst  the  Government  could  be 


THE    UNITY    DESTROYED  291 

guilty  of.  I  am  not  defending  the  party's  principles.  I  do 
not  see  that  there  was  ever  anything  resembling  a  constitution 
in  Russia.  What  I  insist  on  pointing  out  here  is  that  the  party 
was  not  even  true  to  its  own  fictitious  and  timid  conceptions 
of  how  liberty  is  to  be  won  for  the  Russian  nation.  We  see  again 
from  this  failure  to  act  that  constitutionalism  is  not  the  basis  of 
this  party,  but  that  its  very  foundation  is  mere  political 
opportunism  —  to  keep  moving  a  little  bit  in  the  right  direction 
without  reference  to  the  rate  at  which  the  goal  is  neared. 
Having  accepted  from  the  outset  in  its  resolution  to  be  legal  the 
framework  made  for  it  by  the  Government,  the  party  is  now 
operating  within  limitations  so  narrow  as  to  make  it  appear 
quite  ridiculous  in  view  of  the  momentous,  tragic  issues  at  stake. 

The  Russian  independent  press  has  pointed  out  that  the 
Constitutional  Democrats  have  now  taken  the  position  formerly 
occupied  by  the  confessedly  anti-revolutionary  reformers,  the 
Octobrists.  This  party  was  in  favour  of  the  strictest  **  legality  " 
in  all  measures  of  reform  —  that  is,  the  strictest  submission 
to  the  will  of  the  Czar.  Since  the  coup  d'etat,  however,  which 
the  Octobrists  also  confess  to  have  been  a  wholly  illegal  act, 
tney  have  even  lost  this  principle  of  legality,  for  it  was  by 
the  new  illegal  election  law  that  they  were  given  control  of 
the  third  Duma,  and  they  are  now  opposed  to  any  further 
changes  in  the  law.  In  the  same  way  the  Constitutional 
Democrats,  who  were  formerly  constitutionalists,  have 
consented  to  sign  an  address  to  the  Czar  in  the  name  of  the 
whole  of  the  third  Duma  in  which  the  word  ** constitution"  is 
not  mentioned.  All  that  remains  of  their  former  principles  is 
a  sort  of  "legal"  or  "loyal"  opposition  precisely  similar  to  the 
former  opposition  of  the  Octobrists.  From  their  own  stand- 
point, then,  the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party  has  taken 
the  place  of  their  most  bitter  opponents,  the  very  position  which 
they  were  denouncing  a  few  months  ago. 

The  degeneration  of  the  party,  after  having  reached  this 
low  level,  continued  apace.  The  new  timid  position  assumed 
by  the  organisation  while  its  more  radical  members  remained 
in  prison  and  exile,  has  given  an  opportimity  to  an  entirely  new 
class  of  men  to  secure  control.  The  type  that  now  has  the 
greatest  influence  over  the  party  congresses,  however  common 


292  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

in  other  countries,  is  comparatively  rare  in  Russia,  trained  as 
she  is  to  a  large  degree  of  public  spirit  by  her  great  struggle. 
In  the  empire  of  the  Czars  such  public  characters  as  do  not  live 
first  of  all  for  their  coimtry,  but  rather  to  make  a  success  in  their 
own  private  lives,  are  called  "careerists,"  a  term  of  the  utmost 
reproach.  In  America  many  such  anti-social  but  successful 
individuals  are  simply  praised  as  self-made  men.  I  do  not 
imply  that  the  Russian  type  is  in  any  way  different  from  that 
familiar  in  other  countries,  but  only  that  the  type  is  less  common 
and  less  popular  there.  Individuals  who  have  not  been 
imprisoned  recently,  and  are  taking  up  such  a  position  that 
they  are  not  likely  to  be  seriously  persecuted  by  the  Government 
in  the  future,  those  who  have  profited  rather  than  suffered  by 
the  revolution,  now  compose  the  principal  element  in  the 
Constitutional  Democratic  faction  in  the  third  Duma.  I  do 
not  mean  that  such  persons  have  not  been  persecuted  more 
or  less,  but  only  that  they  are  not  being  seriously  persecuted  at 
the  present  moment,  although  they  still  are  submitted  to  the 
irritating  annoyances  of  police  regime.  Examples  of  this  type 
are  commonly  held  to  be  Professor  Milyoukov  himself,  Hessen, 
the  other  editor  of  the  central  organ  of  the  party,  and  Struve, 
the  principal  theoretical  writer.  They  are  all  more  of  the 
German  professorial  type  than  of  the  type  of  the  Russians 
active  in  local  government  who  were  the  true  founders  of 
the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party. 

In  all  that  follows  I  must  warn  the  reader  to  distinguish 
sharply  between  the  degeneration  brought  about  by  these 
leaders  and  their  relatively  small  following,  and  the  opinions 
held  by  those  who  have  merely  voted  for  the  party.  But 
though  we  can  exonerate  the  great  mass  of .  voters,  we  cannot 
exonerate  the  party  organisation.  The  party,  as  well  as  its 
leaders,  is  responsible;  long  ago  it  chose  the  wrong  road. 
Although  the  first  party  congress  took  up  a  clearly  defined  revo- 
lutionary position,  the  second,  deciding  that  Russia  was  already  a 
constitutional  country,  took  the  path  of  a  purely  parliamentary 
agitation  inconsistent  with  any  true  emancipation  movement 
in  a  despotic  land.  They  adopted  the  theory  that  Russia  had 
a  constitution,  and  supposed  that  they  were  following  politically 
advanced  coimtries  like  England  and  the  United  States  where 


THE    UNITY    DESTROYED  293 

legal  convictions  must  flotirish  and  have  played  an  important 
and  useful  role  —  in  times  of  social  peace.  These  Russian 
moderates  have  forgotten  that  no  people  have  ever  been  more 
revolutionary  and  more  practical  in  times  of  social  war  than 
the  people  of  England  and  the  United  States.  A  Cromwell 
would  have  said  of  the  second  Duma,  even  before  the  Czar 
showed  his  scorn  of  it,  "Take  away  that  bauble."  An 
American  assembly  would  certainly  have  signed  some  declaration 
of  independence  even  if  they  had  gone  to  imprisonment  or 
execution  in  the  next  moment.  The  German  professors  of  the 
Constitutional  Democratic  Party  decided  to  talk  about  a 
constitution  in  Russia  tmtil  the  people,  and  the  Czar  himself, 
should  come  to  believe  in  its  existence  —  until  gradually  their 
voices  should  force  the  Government  to  grant  the  reality  in  place 
of  the  shadow. 

The  first  mistake  of  the  Constitutional  Democrats  was  in 
claiming  that  Russia  had  a  constitution.  Article  87  of  the 
fundamental  laws  reduced  almost  to  zero  the  right  of  the  Duma 
to  reject  projects  and  laws  which  the  ministers  have  the 
intention  to  propose,  and  reduced  the  right  of  the  Duma  over 
the  budget,  as  Milyoukov  himself  confessed,  to  all  but  a  pure 
illusion.  The  second  mistake  was  to  take  seriously  a  parliament 
which  had  absolutely  no  power,  and  to  act  as  if  this  were  a 
genuine  parliament.  But  this  was  only  the  beginning  of  a 
whole  series  of  mistakes  which  necessarily  followed. 

The  third  incomprehensible  error  of  this  timid  party  was  in 
not  taking  a  more  decidedly  revolutionary  position  at  the 
time  of  the  Viborg  manifesto  and  in  not  accepting  their  penalties 
at  that  critical  moment  instead  of  being  convicted  two  years 
later  of  political  crime.  As  I  have  indicated,  this  might  have 
brought  the  nation  much  nearer  to  a  crisis. 

The  fourth  mistake  of  the  party  was  when,  after  the 
dissolution  of  the  first  Duma,  it  fell  practically  into  the  hands  of 
the  mere  opportunist  and  politician  Milyoukov  (I  use  politician, 
of  course,  in  the  true  sense  of  a  man  devoted  merely  to  politics 
without  any  ulterior  motives).  I  have  already  shown  how 
this  came  about,  and  that  it  led  to  the  surrender  of  all  the  great 
principles  of  the  Russian  Magna  Charta,  the  address  of  the  first 
Duma  to  the  throne. 


994 


RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 


The  fifth  great  surrender  of  the  party  was  its  prospoal  to 
vote  in  favour  of  the  Government  on  the  question  of  the  budget 
in  the  third  Duma  on  the  ground  that  it  did  not  have  any  power 
over  the  budget  anyway.  Common  sense,  logic,  and  loyalty  to 
principle  would  have  taught,  it  would  seem,  the  opposite 
conclusion:  viz.,  that  the  less  power  the  Duma  had  over  the 
budget  the  more  clearly  it  should  express  itself  as  opposed  to  the 
colossal  robberies  and  frauds  and  waste  of  the  public  money 
which  the  budget  contains. 

The  sixth  and  last  error  which  has  reduced  the  Constitutional 
Democratic  Party  to  a  nonentity  in  the  great  Russian  crisis 
(unless  it  again  reverses  its  decision),  was  its  refusal  to  take 
up  any  effective  position  at  the  time  when  the  Government 
itself  took  away  a  large  part  of  what  this  party  was  pleased  to 
call  the  constitution.  Certainly  the  party  was  unable  to 
prevent  this  action  on  the  part  of  the  Government,  but  it  could 
have  made  a  very  effective  protest  by  making  an  appeal  to  the 
Russian  nation  and  the  whole  world,  showing  the  impossibility  of 
legal  action  in  such  a  country ;  and  it  could  have  resolved  itself 
again  into  a  conspirative  organisation  like  the  Emancipation 
League  of  a  few  years  before,  which  included  the  majority  of  the 
present  leaders  of  the  party. 

Having  taken  the  downward  slope  of  mere  politics  the  party 
has  now  come  to  the  logical  conclusion  of  such  a  policy.  All 
real  politics  have  now  become  impossible,  and  the  party  is 
reduced  to  mere  empty  words  in  a  parliament  constituted  by 
the  Government  to  suit  itself  and  even  then  not  entrusted  with 
any  sovereign  power. 


COSSACK   MEMBERS    OF   THE   CONSTITUTIONAL  DEMOCRATIC   PARTY 
Even  some  of  the  Cossacks  are  against  the  Government 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE      MODERATES      COOPERATE      WITH      THE      REACTIONARIES 

THE  report  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic  party  after 
Czar's  coup  d'etat  shows  very  clearly  the  illogical  basis 
and  impractical  politics  of  the  organisation.  Instead  of  stating 
boldly  the  true  meaning  of  the  great  illegal  act  of  the  Govern- 
ment, the  party  was  satisfied  with  the  most  indirect  indictment. 
"As  to  the  political  and  judicial  meaning  of  the  change  that  has 
taken  place  by  the  act  of  the  3d  of  June,"  says  the  report,  "there 
cannot  be  the  least  difference  of  opinion."  But  it  is  precisely 
the  fundamental  difference  of  opinion  between  those  who  reject 
this  coup  d'etat  and  those  who  do  not  reject  it,  that  constitutes 
the  fundamental  distinction  between  those  who  are  really 
opposing  the  Russian  Government  to-day  and  those  who  are 
opposing  it  only  within  the  lines  of  demarcation  marked  out 
by  the  Government  itself  as  suitable  for  a  "loyal"  opposition 
movement.  The  report  says  that  the  denial  of  the  constitution 
by  the  more  revolutionary  parties  has  injured  the  approval  of  the 
new-bom,  and  far  from  perfect,  constitutionalism  that  was 
growing  up  in  the  public  mind.  The  Constitutional  Democratic 
Party,  then,  far  from  being  the  practical  organisation  that  it 
claims  to  be,  bases  all  its  politics  on  the  shadowy  notion  in  the 
public  mind  concerning  an  institution  of  which  the  Government 
itself,  which  alone  has  the  power  of  interpreting  the  law  of 
Russia,  denies  the  very  existence. 

The  Constitutional  Democrats  in  this  report  accuse  the 
revolutionary  parties  of  having  promised  everything  without 
reference  to  what  they  could  obtain.  The  reverse  is  the  truth. 
The  Socialistic  deputies  selected  by  the  peasants  promised 
"to  fight  for  the  land  and  freedom,"  but  the  cases  were  relatively 
few  in  which  they  held  out  any  hopes  to  the  peasants  of  obtaining 
through  the  Duma  the  things  for  which  they  were  fighting. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  same  report  states  it  definitely  as  a 

295 


296  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

purpose  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party  (in  spite  of 
the  utter  absence  of  popular  government  in  Russia)  "to  realise 
solutions  for  certain  national  problems."  The  leaders  of  the 
party  now  confess  privately  that  they  have  no  hopes  whatever 
for  any  such  general  solutions.  The  party  claims  of  course 
that  it  could  have  persuaded  the  Government  to  grant  some- 
thing in  the  way  of  compromises,  had  it  not  been  for  the  revo- 
lutionary attitude  of  the  Socialistic  peasant  and  workingmen 
deputies  —  but  it  must  be  noted  that  the  representatives  of 
the  people  did  not  wish  to  stand  for  such  half-way  and  totally 
unsatisfactory  measures  as  were  called  "reform"  by  the  Con- 
stitutional Democrats.  This  may  be  seen  sufficiently  clear 
from  the  proposed  "solution"  of  the  agrarian  question.  The 
representatives  of  the  people  were  in  favour  of  creating  a  great 
land  fund  from  which  land  should  be  granted  only  temporarily  to 
the  peasants  or  to  local  governmental  units  representing  them. 
In  order  to  defeat  this  proposition  the  Constitutional  Democrats 
had  to  vote  not  only  with  the  conservative  Polish  party,  but 
with  the  party  of  the  landlords  themselves. 

The  report  makes  it  very  clear  why  the  Constitutional  Demo- 
cratic party  had  taken  up  a  generally  conservative  position. 
It  rebukes  one  of  the  Socialist  parties  for  asking  a  more  conser- 
vative organisation  to  "plunge  into  illegality  without  any  refer- 
ence to  any  other  social  force  and  whether  or  not  there  is  any 
general  upheaval  in  the  country."  It  is  not  true  that  the 
majority  of  the  revolutionary  deputies  wanted  any  important 
section  of  the  Russian  people  to  plunge  into  illegality  without 
reference  to  the  other  sections;  all  expected  and  still  expect 
the  overwhelming  majority  of  all  sections  to  act  together  in  a 
revolutionary  movement.  But  it  is  perfectly  true  that  all 
the  revolutionary  organisations  want  all  who  claim  to  represent 
any  important  part  of  the  people,  to  plunge  into  illegality 
whether  or  not  there  are  any  immediate  hopes  for  success  of 
the  revolution.  Where  a  government,  consisting  in  consider- 
able part  of  murderers  and  criminals,  as  it  is  agreed  by  all  the 
oppositional  elements,  has  in  its  power  the  absolute  decision 
as  to  what  is  legal  and  what  is  illegal,  it  certainly  behooves 
every  honest  opponent  to  repudiate  once  for  all  this  official 
legality. 


MODERATES  COOPERATE  WITH  REACTIONARIES  297- 

As  the  consequences  of  such  principles  and  such  politics 
the  Constitutional  Democratic  Party  cut  a  very  sorry  figure 
in  the  second  Duma.  Most  of  the  great  occasions  were  quite 
dominated  by  the  Social  Democratic  party,  consisting  largely 
of  workingmen;  and  even  the  peasants'  deputies,  though  less 
educated  and  capable,  got  the  better  of  their  Constitutional 
Democratic  opponents.  When  Stolypine  had  given  his  insult- 
ing opening  address,  the  moderate  parties,  for  fear  of  offending 
him,  decided  to  make  no  reply,  but  the  Social  Democrats  in 
the  person  of  their  brilliant  orator,  Zeretelly,  took  advan- 
tage of  this  great  opportunity  to  tell  the  story  of  Russia's 
condition  to  the  civilised  world.  It  was  perhaps  the  best 
oratorical  effort  of  the  whole  Duma,  inspired  as  it  was  from 
start  to  finish  by  an  outright  tone  of  utter  hostility  to  the 
Government. 

"By  all  its  actions,"  said  Zeretelly,  "the  Government  has 
opened  the  eyes,  even  of  the  blind,  to  see  and  understand  the 
indissoluble  bonds  that  exist  between  the  autocratic  Govern- 
ment and  a  band  of  landlord  ex-serfholders  who  prey  upon 
the  millions  of  homeless  peasants." 

Zeretelly  then  went  on  in  his  famous  speech  to  expose  the 
Government's  efforts  to  subdue,  terrorise,  and  crush  into 
submission  the  miserable  peasant  population.  He  pointed 
out  that  two-thirds  of  Russia  had  been  placed  under  martial 
law,  transformed  into  a  number  of  entirely  independent  satrap- 
ies and  given  up  to  the  arbitrary  will  of  authorised  generals 
to  accomplish  their  purposes.  He  recalled  the  organisation 
of  the  massacres  by  the  Government  and  the  bombardment 
of  whole  villages  and  towns  and  the  killing  of  innocent  people, 
and  made  a  convincing  argument  that  the  actions  constituted 
nothing  less  than  warfare  against  the  nation.  It  took  courage 
to  use  such  language  at  this  time.  Zeretelly  knew  almost 
certainly  that  he  would  be  imprisoned  for  many  years  for  his 
words,  as  he  was  talking  in  the  very  claws  of  the  Government, 
surrounded  as  the  Duma  was  by  overwhelming  military  force. 
He  was  not  disappointed  and  is  now  in  prison  for  a  term  of 
years,  not  only  losing  a  large  part  of  his  youth  (he  is  not  thirty 
yet),  but  risking  his  life,  for  he  is  dangerously  ill. 

The  concluding  part  of  his  speech  was  even  more  outspoken 


^98  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE' ~ 

than  the  first,  being  a  direct  appeal  to  revolutionary  action 
outside  of  the  Duma: 

We,  the  servants  of  the  people,  must  direct  and  concencrate  all  our 
energy,  all  our  aspiration  and  efforts  toward  helping  the  people  to  unite 
and  organise,  because  only  with  the  help  and  direct  support  of  the 
people  will  it  be  possible  to  stop  the  wild  debauch  of  the  oppressors  who 
are  devasting  the  country.  You,  fellow  citizens,  representatives  of  the 
people,  probably  remember  well  how  ten  months  ago  the  deputy  Nabokov 
(Constitutional  Democrat)  from  the  height  of  the  Duma  platform  rightly 
said  to  the  Government,  "The  executive  power  shall  be  subordinated  to 
the  legislative  power."  Two  months  after  the  executive  power,  supported 
by  bayonets,  dispersed  the  legislative  power.  I  am  saying  all  this  simply 
to  show  you  that  we  have  no  real  constitution,  that  there  are  only 
symptoms  of  one,  and  that  every  step  of  ours  must  .be  directed  first  of 
all  toward  solidifying  the  people  into  an  organised  force  capable  of 
wiping  off  from  the  face  of  the  earth  its  autocratic  Government. 

Let  the  revealing  voice  of  the  representatives  of  the  people  sound 
through  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  country  and  wake  up  to  the 
struggle  those  who  are  not  yet  awake.  And  let  the  Duma  at  the  same 
time  organise  and  rally  the  awakened  masses  through  legislation;  let 
us  stir  up  in  this  way  the  actual  force  of  the  people  which  is  the  only 
support  to  any  real  constitution.  Without  this  force  the  people  will 
never  get  either  freedom  or  land,  will  never  be  able  to  take  them  from 
the  hands  of  the  Government.  This  force  is  growing  every  day,  e very- 
hour.  The  people,  once  conscious  of  their  rights,  will  sooner  or  later 
unite  for  the  realisation  of  those  rights.  This  movement  cannot  be 
stopped  by  the  autocratic  Government.  May  be,  I  say  may  be,  this 
Duma  will  be  no  more  in  a  week  from  now,  but  the  mighty  popular 
movement  which  succeeded  in  leading  Russia  from  the  old  shores  will 
succeed  with  the  Duma,  or  without  it,  in  forcing  a  path  through  all 
obstacles  in  freedom's  way. 

And  now  since  the  hour  has  not  yet  arrived,  we  do  not  yet  call  upon 
the  Government  to  submit  to  the  people's  power.  We  turn  to  the 
people's  representatives  with  the  appeal  to  organise  that  power.  We 
do  not  say  with  the  Constitutional  Democrats  that  the  executive  power 
should  submit  to  the  legislative.  We  say,  "In  union  with  the  people, 
bound  up  with  the  people,  legislative  power  will  force  the  submission 
of  the  executive  power!  " 

The  Constitutional  Democrats  not  only  refused  to  join  issue 
with  the  Government  at  the  opening  of  the  second  Duma; 
they  failed  to  represent  the  nation  again  and  again  during  the 
session.  The  demand  for  complete  political  amjiesty,  the  first 
words  uttered  in  the  first  Duma,  was  laid  aside  by  the  second 
Duma.     The    Constitutionalists,    defending   their    timidity    on 


A  TYPICAL  YOUNG  VILLAGE  ORATOR  AND  LEADER 


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MODERATES  COOPERATE  WITH  REACTIONARIES  299 

this  question,  claimed  that  they  had  no  "legal  power"  over 
it.  It  was  on  the  same  groimds  that  they  decided  to  vote  in 
favour  of  the  budget  and  in  favour  of  granting  the  very  recruits 
that  were  being  used  for  the  bloody  "punishment  expeditions." 
Perhaps  even  more  traitorous  was  the  conduct  of  certain 
members  of  the  party  in  voting  in  favour  of  the  validity  of  the 
elections  in  Poltava,  where  conservatives  had  been  returned  by 
the  most  outrageous  official  frauds.  The  stolen  seats  were 
held  by  the  reactionaries  through  the  aid  not  only  of  the  con- 
servative members,  but  also  of  part  of  the  so-called  moderates, 
who  in  this  act  more  clearly  than  any  other  showed  themselves 
to  be  the  humble  servants  of  the  Government. 

Several  of  the  great  debates  deserve  to  be  noticed,  as  showing 
how  the  Constitutional  Democrats  have  retreated  from  their 
former  position,  and  as  showing  the  widening  gulf  between 
them  and  the  radical  opposition.  In  the  discussion  of  the 
budget  the  Constitutional  Democrats  allowed  their  criticisms 
to  be  conducted  chiefly  by  ex-Minister  Kutler  who  had  just 
joined  their  party.  His  criticism  was  entirely  taken  up  with 
matters  of  petty  details,  just  as  if  this  discussion  had  taken 
place  during  an  ordinary  peaceful  period  in  any  free  coimtry. 
The  revolutionary  Social  Democrat,  Alexinsky,  of  St.  Peters- 
burg, scathingly  denounced  the  Constitutional  Democrats  along 
with  their  Governmental  allies,  since  in  this  case  there  was  no 
fundamental  disagreement.     Further  on  Alexinsky  said: 

When  a  representative  of  the  Government,  a  representative  of  State 
authority,  comes  before  the  representatives  of  the  people  with  his  first 
account  of  his  financial  activity,  he  ought  to  give  them  not  merely  a 
formal  justification,  he  ought  not  to  refer  to  clauses  and  paragraphs 
of  dead  old  laws.  He  ought  to  bring  a  living  justification  —  that  is, 
a  justification  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  people's  interests,  a 
justification  for  those  enormous  expenses  which  have  exhausted  and 
impoverished  our  unfortunate  people.  This  real  justification  has  not 
been  given  us. 

The  minister  told  us  our  indebtedness  and  the  unfavourable  condition 
of  our  finances  are  to  a  great  extent  due  to  war  expenses.  He  pointed 
out  to  us  that  there  was  a  time  when  Russia  stood  as  the  defender  of  the 
whole  of  Europe.  He  referred  to  the  beginning  of  the  last  century  and 
considers  the  r61e  that  Russia  had  played  then  to  be  a  sufficient  reason 
and  justification  for  the  nine  billions  of  debt  that  now  rests  on  our  State 
treasury. 


300  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

I  must  say  that  the  workingmen  that  have  sent  me  here,  people  who 
are  less  informed  perhaps  on  the  question  of  finance  and  politics,  have 
reasoned  thus:  It  is  true  that  Russia  has  played  an  important  r61e  in 
foreign  events  and  in  the  international  conflicts  of  Europe;  but  it  is  not 
enough  to  play  an  important  r61e;  the  question  is,  what  kind  of  a  r61e 
and  to  whose  interest  is  it?  And  in  studying  the  history  of  Russia  the 
workingmen  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  when  the  Government 
of  Russia  tried  to  be  the  guard  of  "law  and  order,"  at  home  and  in  other 
countries,  it  has  always  been  striving  to  play  the  role  of  an  international 
gendarme. 

Alexinsky's  last  phrase,  which  may  seem  dark  to  us,  is  worth 
making  clear.  France  has  furnished  immense  sums  of  money 
to  the  Czar  which  he  has  used  for  the  purpose  of  crushing  the 
movement  of  freedom  in  Russia.  France  loaned  this  money 
only  because  she  thought  she  could  make  use  of  the  Russian 
army  in  the  event  of  war  with  Germany.  Russia  has  agreed 
to  help  France  against  Germany  almost  entirely  in  return  for 
this  money.  The  French  bankers,  then,  were  paying  for 
mercenary  aid  from  the  Russian  Government.  The  Russian 
Government  may  be  maintaining  law  and  order  in  Europe, 
but  it  is  doing  it  only  in  order  to  help  herself  to  maintain  her 
authority  and  continue  her  oppression  at  home. 

The  most  sensational  debate  was  that  over  the  granting  of 
recruits.  Here,  as  before,  the  position  of  the  moderates  and 
that  of  the  Government  were  all  but  identical.  The  real  conflict 
was  between  the  moderates  and  the  revolutionists.  The 
moderate  deputy,  Hessen,  pointed  out  that  the  Duma  did  not 
have  any  power  according  to  "Article  119  of  the  fundamental 
laws,"  to  decrease  the  number  of  recruits.  It  seemed  to  the 
radicals  that  this  was  all  the  more  reason  that  the  Duma  should 
express  itself  clearly  on  the  subject.  Constitutional  Democrats 
of  the  new  conservative  type,  ex-Minister  Kutler  and  the  jurist 
Maklakov,  tried  to  warn  the  radicals  that  the  rank  and  file  of 
the  Russian  people  would  not  stand  for  this  "unpatriotic" 
attack  on  the  army,  showing  that  their  real  motive  in  supporting 
the  Government  was  not  the  Duma's  lack  of  power  to  deal  with 
the  question  but  rather  the  moderates'  lack  of  faith  in-  the 
people,  the  most  deep-seated  curse  of  this  rapidly  degenerating^ 
party. 

The  peasant  deputy  Semenov,  after  the  manner  of  intelligent 


MODERATES  COOPERATE  WITH  REACTIONARIES  301 

but  half-educated  persons,  went  straight  to  the  heart  of  the 
subject  and  accused  the  Government  of  increasing  the  number 
of  recruits  in  order  to  "keep  us  in  slavery  as  before,  so  that 
we  shall  be  under  oppression  and  get  it  from  the  nagaikas, 
bayonets,  and  machine  guns  as  we  have  always  got  it." 
He  continued: 

What  do  the  soldiers  serve?  The  State  and  Fatherland?  No,  they  serve 
the  officers  who  compel  them  to  take  care  of  their  dogs.  .  .  .  All  we 
are  taught  wnen  we  enter  the  army  is  the  title,  forename,  and  father's 
name  of  the  sergeant,  officers,  and  others.  What  kind  of  science  is  this? 
The  soldiers  ought  to  be  taught  business.  .  .  .  We  ought  to  recollect 
the  saying,  "that  the  soldier  is  no  good  if  he  has  no  ambition  to  become  a 
general."  But  can  the  soldier  who  has  to  take  care  of  the  officers'  dogs 
ever  become  a  general? 

"We  promise  to  defend  Russia,  but  we  will  never  defend 
the  landlords!  "  cried  another  peasant  deputy.  Others  spoke  to 
the  same  effect,  showing  the  deep-lying  hatred  of  military  ser- 
vice and  the  officer  caste  that  exists  in  all  classes  of  the  people. 
But  it  was  the  Social  Democrat  Zurabov,  an  army  officer  him- 
self, who  created  the  greatest  sensation  of  the  season.  Speaking 
as  an  officer,  a  Socialist  and  a  revolutionist,  Zurabov  quickly 
came  to  the  point  that  there  existed  a  war  in  Russia  between 
the  people  and  the  Government.     He  said: 

We  do  not  consider  it  possible  to  declare  an  armistice ;  we  do  not  find 
it  possible  to  enter  into  any  negotiations  with  the  old  power;  we  are  on 
the  field  of  battle  and  therefore  it  would  be  insanity  on  our  part  to  grant 
this  old  power  the  armament  it  demands.  ...  In  order  to  make 
the  army  serve  as  a  blind  tool  for  its  own  purpose  and  interests,  the 
autocratic  Government  terrorises  it  by  an  iron  and  utterly  merciless 
discipline  which  makes  of  a  living  human  being  a  soulless  machine  that 
neither  thinks  nor  is  conscious  of  its  acts,  that  can  be  turned  and 
compelled  to  act  in  any  direction  wanted  by  its  chiefs.     .     .     . 

It  is  impossible  with  the  little  money  the  soldier  is  paid  to  meet  the 
demands  of  barrack  life,  to  have  boots,  to  mend  clothes  and  to  provide 
himself  with  soap  and  blacking  and  so  on.  For  all  these  needs,  to  say 
nothing  of  others,  forty-five  kopecks  a  month  is  certainly  not  sufficient. 
The  soldier,  in  order  to  provide  himself  with  what  he  is  compelled  and 
ordered  to  have,  resorts  to  robbery  and  thieving,  and  thus  becomes  in 
the  end  demoralised.  ...  As  far  as  oiu"  army  officers  are  con- 
cerned, it  is  a  well  known  fact  that  the  majority  are  the  most  ignorant 
of  men.  And  this  is  true  not  only  in  regard  to  their  general  character, 
but  even  in  regard  to  their  own  specialty.     As  the  result  of  all  this  we 


302  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

have  an  army  which  is  from  top  to  bottom  entirely  unfit  for  outer  defence ; 
no  wonder  that  this  army  has  given  us  such  chiefs  as  the  Renenkanovs, 
Orlovs,  and  Karilbavs.  That  they  are  the  dullest  of  men  nobody  can 
doubt. 

Our  army  under  the  autocratic  state,  no  matter  how  often  we  are  told 
differently  from  these  benches,  will  never  be  fit  for  the  purpose  of  outer 
defence.  Such  an  army  will  successfully  fight  us  (the  people)  and  will 
successfully  disperse  you  (the  people's  assembly),  but  it  will  always 
suffer  defeat  from  the.  East. 

Here  began  outcries  from  the  reactionary  deputies  against 
the  speaker,  accusing  him  of  treason,  and  here  occurred  the 
greatest  and  final  disgrace  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic 
Party.  The  organisation  was  now  hurried  into  a  sensational 
reactionary  position  by  the  notorious  Jew-baiter,  Puresche- 
vitch.  Pureschevitch  interjected  repeatedly  and  at  the  top 
of  his  voice,  "Get  out!"  and  Golovine,  the  president.  Constitu- 
tional Democrat,  instead  of  calling  him  to  order,  turned  to 
Zurabov  and  asked  him  not  to  make  such  remarks  in  the  Duma 
as  there  was  **no  ground  for  such  opinions."  But  in  the  recent 
trials  of  the  generals  that  conducted  the  late  war  with  Japan 
it  has  become  clear  that  Zurabov  was  probably  right;  Russia 
would  have  little  hope  of  victory  under  the  present  regime. 
Golovine  postponed  the  sitting  and  when  it  was  resumed  later 
proposed  the  suspension  of  Zurabov  from  the  Duma,  because 
"of  his  insulting  expression  regarding  the  Russian  army."  As 
a  result  the  peasant  and  workingmen  deputies,  representing 
the  vast  majority  of  the  Russian  people,  left  the  hall. 

After  a  second  secret  session  held  the  next  day,  the  Social 
Democrats  returned  to  the  attack  and  exposed  clearly  the  true 
ground  for  the  Constitutional  Democratic  position.  Quoting 
from  Struve's  paper,  the  Northern  Star,  Alexinsky  showed 
that  the  writer  had  claimed  that  only  a  standing  army  in  the 
hands  of  the  "conscious  elements  of  the  country,"  that  is,  of 
the  liberal  landlords  and  middle  classes  which  Struve  represents, 
could  serve  as  a  reliable  means  against  popular  outbreaks.  We 
see  then  that  the  leading  motive  of  the  Constitutional  Demo- 
crats of  Struve's  type  at  least  was  probably  already,  not^only 
to  win  the  friendship  of  the  Government  by  concession,  but 
also  to  make  use  of  the  army  to  crush  the  revolutionary  move- 
ment.    Alexinsky  again  reproached  the  Constitutional  Demo 


MODERATES  COOPERATE  WITH  REACTIONARIES  303 

crats,  who  had  a  few  months  before  counselled  the  nation  in  the 
Viborg  manifesto  not  to  give  a  single  soldier  or  a  single  kopeck 
to  the  Government,  for  having  betrayed  the  people.  It  was 
true  certainly  that  the  Constitutional  Democrats  voted  for 
recruits,  which  a  few  months  before  they  had  called  on  the  people 
to  refuse  at  the  risk  of  their  lives.  It  was  also  true  that  they 
had  every  reason  for  supposing  that  within  a  few  weeks  an 
even  more  critical  situation  might  arise. 

Again  during  this  speech  the  reactionaries  showed  that  they 
were  at  one  with  the  so-called  Constitutional  Democrats- 
Count  Bobrinsky  interrupted  to  exclaim,  "Against  the  common 
enemy  we  will  fight  as  one!"  A  few  moments  before  Pures- 
chevitch  had  called  out  to  Alexinsky,  "The  whole  question 
is  who  is  who  will  hang  whom  —  I  you,  or  you  me."  In  the 
most  violent  attack  that  the  reactionaries  ever  made  on  the 
people's  deputies  of  the  Duma,  the  Constitutonal  Democrats 
found  themselves  at  one  with  the  defenders  of  all  the  iniquities, 
of  the  Czarism. 


CHAPTER  V 

BEGGING    FOR    CRUMBS 

IT  APPEARED  clearly  after  the  dissolution  of  the  first 
Duma  and  at  the  opening  of  the  third,  that  the  moderate 
leaders  had  not  carried  with  them  the  mass  of  the  party- 
adherents.  In  its  last  congress  the  Constitutional  Democratic 
Party  was  faced  by  a  serious  internal  crisis.  As  usual,  Professor 
Milyoukov  presided.  In  his  opening  speech  he  stated  the 
ultra-parliamentary  view  that  the  October  Manifesto  and 
fundamental  laws,  though  practically  broken  on  June  3rd,  still 
remained  judicially  in  force,  and  that  the  party  still  considered 
its  policy  to  be  the  carrying  on  of  the  struggle  on  a  legal  basis, 
so  long  as  this  proves  in  the  least  degree  possible.  We  see 
then  that  the  Government  has  only  to  leave  to  the  Constitutional 
Democrats  a  petty  and  insignificant  field  of  legal  action  in 
order  to  make  it  a  perfectly  harmless  organisation. 

Milyoukov  said  in  conclusion  that  his  party,  although  it 
would  be  in  the  minority  of  the  third  Duma,  would  represent 
the  people.  This  is  untrue.  The  Russian  nation,  as  is  clear 
from  all  three  elections,  is  represented  by  parties  far  more 
radical  than  the  Constitutional  Democrats.  The  very  tragedy 
of  the  situation  for  this  legal  party  is  that  it  has  neither  the 
legal  power  of  a  Dimaa  majority  nor  the  moral  power  of  an 
organisation  that  can  claim  to  represent  the  Russian  nation. 

Milyoukov  is  such  a  power  at  the  moment  that  perhaps 
his  position  should  be  further  explained.  It  must  be  remem- 
bered that  before  the  revolutionary  movement  began,  he  was 
quite  sympathetic  toward  it.  In  his  book,  "The  Russian 
Crisis,"  he  speaks  in  favour  of  a  direct  agreement  between  the 
liberals  and  revolutionists,  in  favour  of  the  radical  idea  of  a 
single  legislative  chamber,  and  also  in  favour  of  the  State 
making  a  large  financial  contribution  toward  the  solution  of 
the  land  question.     The  latter  reform  he   seemed    ready    to 

304 


BEGGING  FOR  CRUMBS  305 

abandon  when,  at  the  time  of  the  second  Duma,  he  expressed 
himself  as  hoping  to  get  some  agreement  with  Stolypine  on  this 
question.  He  has  now  entirely  dropped  his  agitation  in  favour 
of  the  single  chamber;  and  finally,  he  has  become  the  most 
active  opponent  of  the  revolutionary  movement  in  his  party. 
He  is  becoming  a  mere  opportunist,  stating  recently  in  an 
interview  that  the  party  would  enter  the  Duma  with  certain 
principles  but  would  be  ready  to  abandon  any  of  them  if  this 
would  bring  it  the  least  nearer  to  its  main  goal,  a  constitution. 
In  explaining  his  desertion  of  his  "revolutionary  friends," 
he  said  that  he  had  done  this  because  they  had  no  longer  any 
power.  It  is  quite  true,  of  course,  that  their  power  is  very 
limited,  but  it  is  also  true,  as  has  been  shown,  that  the 
moderates  have  very  little  power  over  the  Duma,  or  through  it 
over  the  Government.  If  every  section  of  the  revolutionary 
army  were  to  desert  every  other  section  on  the  ground  that  the 
"other  fellow"  had  little  or  no  power,  at  this  depressing 
moment  the  revolutionary  movement  would  break  up  entirely. 

Milyoukov's  attitude  at  the  time  of  the  great  crisis,  the 
coup  d'etat  of  June  3rd,  gives  us  a  very  deep  insight  into  his 
reasoning.  Instead  of  attributing  this  calamity,  not  to  any 
moral  cause,  but  to  the  sheer  immoral  physical  power  of  the 
Government,  he  seeks  to  find  an  answer  to  the  questions: 
"Where  lies  the  blame?  In  the  ill  will  of  the  rulers?  In  the 
bad  statesmanship  of  the  governing  class?  In  the  mistakes  of 
the  leaders  of  the  emancipation  movement?  In  a  reaction 
against  the  revolutionary  excesses?"  We  might  very  well 
answer  all  these  questions  with  a  whole  or  partial  affirmative, 
but  we  still  would  not  have  given  the  real  answer.  The 
Government  dissolved  the  Duma  almost  wholly  on  the  ground 
that  it  had  the  power  to  do  so  and  that  it  found  the  Duma  to  a 
greater  or  lesser  degree  inconvenient  to  its  plan  of  oppression. 

In  a  conversation  with  Professor  Milyoukov  about  this 
time,  I  asked  him  on  what  real  force  outside  of  the  mere  justice 
of  the  cause  he  thought  his  party  could  rely.  The  only  answer 
which  he  gave  was  that  such  a  force  existed  in  "the  disorgani- 
sation and  anarchy  in  the  country  caused  by  spontaneous, 
disorganised  acts  of  rebellion  and  individual  crime."  The 
present   Government   being   totally   incapable   of   successfully 


3o6  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

repressing  this  kind  of  blind  revolt,  Professor  Milyoukov  thought 
that  it  would  one  day  be  taught  to  rely  on  the  capacity  of  his 
party  to  restore  order.  There  is  no  question  that  the  disorgani- 
sation referred  to  —  robbery,  arson,  and  assassination  —  existed 
on  an  enormous  scale  at  that  time  and  continues  almost  unabated 
at  the  present  moment.  But  let  us  consider  the  logical 
consequences  for  this  party  from  placing  its  sole  reliance  on 
unorganised  and  semi-criminal  disorder.  In  doing  this 
Professor  Milyoukov's  party  is  depending  upon  the  forces 
entirely  outside  .of  its  own  control.  A  party  that  relies  on 
factors  outside  of  its  control  is  not  only  opportunist,  but 
exclusively  opportunist.  In  hoping  to  benefit  indirectly  from 
the  reigning  disorder,  Milyoukov  and  his  followers  are  depending 
on  a  destructive  tendency,  and  they  lay  themselves  open  to  the 
accusation  that  they  themselves  passively  welcome  this  anarchy. 
Of  course  it  may  be  that  this  anarchistic  tendency  will  be 
successfully  suppressed  by  the  present  Government.  In  that 
case  this  accusation  will  have  no  further  application,  but  to-day 
the  party  still  remains  guilty  of  having  based  its  hopes  on  chaos. 
Milyoukov,  Struve,  and  other  leaders  are  even  making  over- 
tures to  the  enemy.  Thus  the  party  paper,  after  the  dissolution 
of  the  second  Duma,  said  that  the  fate  of  the  third  would  depend 
wholly  on  the  class  of  proprietors,  but  that  they  had  not  lost 
faith  absolutely  and  still  hoped  that  in  this  class  there  would 
be  sufficient  vitality  and  intelligence  to  repudiate  an  egotistic 
policy  of  special  privilege.  These  living  elements  would  shatter 
"the  reactionaries'  illusion  of  the  unity  and  solidity  of  the 
big  land-holding  class.''  We  have  seen  that  the  big  land- 
owning class  is  in  fact  the  heart  of  the  reaction,  and  that 
opposition  to  this  class,  rather  than  any  effort  to  obtain  such 
insignificant  reforms  as  could  be  secured  with  its  aid,  is  the  life 
principle  of  the  revolutionary  movement.  The  position  here 
taken  does  not  materially  differ  from  that  of  the  confessedly 
conservative  leader  of  the  majority  of  the  third  Duma.  In  a 
conversation  I  had  with  Gutchkov  at  this  time  he  said  he  also 
considered  the  landlords  to  be  sufficiently  liberal,  and  explained 
then  he  had  no  ideas  of  any  fundamental  economic  reform  for 
the  peasantry,  and  that  he  was  aware  that  the  Government 
measures  which  he  favoured  would  throw  millions  of  peasants 


BEGGING  FOR  CRUMBS  307 

once  and  for  all  in  the  class  of  absolutely  pauperised  agricultural 
labourers  He  also  confessed  that  he  believed  in  the  existing 
military  courts  and  that  he  was  sure  that  they  would  do  no 
injustice ! 

This  then  is  the  leader  alongside  of  whom  the  Constitutional 
Democratic  organ  took  its  position  in  the  most  practical 
question  of  third  Duma  politics.  Later  at  the  congress  of  the 
party  the  same  conservative  elements  that  were  responsible  for 
the  article  just  quoted,  were  able  to  put  through  a  resolution 
allowing  an  agreement  between  this  so-called  Constitutional 
Democratic  Party  and  Gutchkov's  Octobrists,  who  in  their 
congress  declared  first  of  all  for  "the  restoration  of  authority," 
then  against  equal  rights  to  the  Jews,  against  any  reform  of  the 
Czar's  new  election  law,  and  in  favour  of  the  agrarian  politics 
of  the  Government.  When  the  Duma  met  an  Octobrist  was 
elected  president  and  secured,  among  others,  the  votes  of  the 
Constitutional  Democrats.  In  his  opening  speech  he  said  that 
the  purpose  of  the  Duma  was  to  fulfill  the  "sovereign  will  of 
the  Czar"  and  made  no  mention  of  the  constitution. 

At  this  time  Maklakov,  one  of  the  Constitutional  Democrat 
leaders  of  the  Milyoukov  type,  explained  in  an  interview  that 
it  was  only  necessary  "in  order  to  completely  suppress  the 
revolution"  that  the  Duma  should  be  placed  on  a  firm  footing 
and  that  he  believed  in  "a  loyal  opposition"  and  was  satisfied 
that  the  majority  of  the  Duma  (landlords)  was  progressive. 
This  so-called  popular  leader  was  then  satisfied  with  the  very 
element  that  he  knew  had  actively  engaged  in  and  aided 
the  massacres  and  persecutions  conducted  by  the  Russian 
Government. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  add  that  these  hopes  in  the  landlords, 
whether  genuine  or  only  meant  to  flatter,  are  coming  to  nothing. 
The  moderate  party  expressed  its  hopes  to  accomplish  in  the 
third  Duma,  with  the  aid  of  the  landlords,  at  least  two  reforms  — 
that  of  the  local  government,  and  that  of  the  administration  of 
justice.  The  local  government  reform  has  already  fallen  to 
committees  formed  of  the  very  landlords  who  have  done  the 
most  to  corrupt  it,  and  justice  is  being  regenerated  in  an  equally 
ludicrous  manner.  New  justices  of  the  peace  are  to  be  instituted 
and  the  old  detested  "land  officials"  abolished,  but  the  new 


SoS  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

justices  are  to  have  qualifications  which  make  it  certain  that 
few  if  any  of  them  will  be  peasants,  while  at  the  same  time  the 
popular  peasants'  courts  of  course  are  to  be  abolished.  But 
there  is  an  even  worse  judicial  "reform"  —  a  reform  carried 
even  through  the  reactionary  Council  of  the  Empire  by  a 
majority  of  only  four  votes  among  a  hundred  and  fifty.  In  his 
speech  in  favour  of  this  typical  governmental  reform  the 
Minister  of  Justice  spoke  practically  in  these  words:  "The 
Government  cannot  exist  if  the  possibility  is  taken  away  from 
it  of  conducting  the  inner  politics  of  the  country.  The  right 
to  choose  the  personnel  of  State  institutions  (the  judges)  is  a 
mighty  weapon  for  the  direction  of  politics  on  the  road 
prescribed  for  them  by  His  Majesty.''  This  reform  will  consist, 
then,  of  a  new  supreme  court  to  be  as  usual  entirely  under  the 
thumb  of  the  Czar. 

Against  the  moderate  new  politics  of  sacrificing  everything 
for  such  "reforms,"  the  revolt  in  the  party  itself  is  serious. 
When  Milyoukov  and  other  leaders  of  the  last  party  congress 
voted  down  the  proposition  that  the  party  should  take  a  strong 
oppositional  stand  and  avoid  all  rapprochement  with  the 
Octobrists,  and  that  it  should  only  support  laws  which  would 
lead  to  the  increase  of  freedom  of  the  people  or  to  the  democrati- 
sation  of  the  Russian  institutions,  the  progressive  element 
at  last  realised  where  they  stood.  Already  Mandelstam, 
whom  a  recent  referendum  had  shown  to  be  the  favourite 
candidate  of  half  of  the  party  members  in  Moscow,  had  resigned 
from  the  Central  Committee.  Another  important  leader  and 
member  of  the  first  Duma  resigned  from  the  party  altogether, 
and  the  principal  independent  and  radical  newspapers  of  the 
country  nearly  all  took  up  a  more  or  less  hostile  position  to 
the  organisation,  even  though  they  had  been  very  friendly 
before.  Many  other  active  party  members  turned  aside  from 
party  work  into  a  new  educational  propaganda,  with  a  view 
to  getting  the  nation  ready  for  a  new  revolutionary  movement 
in  later  years. 

In  the  recent  congress  Mandelstam  accused  the  ,  party 
management  of  the  second  Duma  of  having  failed  to  reassert  the 
principle  on  which  they  staked  everything  during  the  first, 
that  of  the  responsibility  of  the  ministers,  not  to  the  Czar. 


BEGGING  FOR  CRUMBS  309 

but  to  the  national  assembly,  and  of  having  foolishly  supposed 
up  to  the  very  day  of  its  dissolution  that  the  Government, 
pleased  by  their  new  docility,  would  allow  the  Duma  to  continue. 
He  claimed  it  was  a  mistake  for  the  party  to  accept  peacefully 
the  coup  d'etat,  and  that  it  should  rather  rely  on  the  new 
wave  of  revolution  which  must  arise.  He  thought  that  the 
party  ought  now  at  least  to  see  that,  since  the  Duma  was  elected 
to  suit  the  Government,  the  latter  would  make  concessions 
rather  to  its  extreme  reactionary  friends  in  that  body,  than  to 
the  Constitutional  Democrats  or  other  oppositional  elements. 

"In  a  pseudo-constitutional  regime  the  chief  task,"  said 
Mandelstam,  "is  to  define  the  means  of  securing  a  real 
constitution,  and  behold  we  are  told  (by  Milyoukov  and  his 
friends)  to  try  and  convince  the  Government."  Another 
speaker,  Safonov  of  Kostroma,  a  member  of  the  first  Duma, 
who  represented  a  very  large  part  of  all  the  party  members 
and  a  still  larger  part  of  the  voters  themselves,  said  that  the 
party  would  find  itself  in  the  third  Duma  in  the  hostile  camp 
of  the  anti-Constitutionalists,  that  compromise  was  not  only 
dangerous  to  the  party,  but  to  the  whole  social  movement,  and 
that  the  proper  function  of  the  party  in  the  third  Duma  was 
purely  one  of  criticism.  The  only  important  point  in  Milyoukov's 
answer  was  the  claim  that  the  voters  had  shown  they  were 
satisfied  with  the  party.  As  I  have  made  plain,  this  is  wholly 
false. 

This  was  not  the  final  fall  of  Milyoukov.  When  Roditchev, 
a  Constitutional  Democratic  leader  scarcely  less  important  than 
Milyoukov,  during  an  early  session  of  the  third  Duma,  made 
his  sensational  attack  on  Stolypine,  saying  that  in  future  the 
gallows  would  be  called  "Stolypine  neckties,"  Milyoukov  with  ^ 
several  other  party  members  in  the  Duma  took  part  in  the 
reactionary  demonstration  of  sympathy  for  Stolypine!  So 
shocking  was  this  act  to  the  Russian  nation  that  even  the 
Central  Committee  could  not  stand  it  and  Milyoukov  was  called 
before  it  for  a  reprimand.  Certainly  he  could  not  have 
degraded  his  party  further  in  the  opinion  of  the  country. 

I  have  given  so  much  attention  to  Professor  Milyoukov 
and  his  opinions  and  his  actions,  that  I  cannot  avoid  at  least 
a  brief  mention  of  another  type  of  leader,  Prince  Shakovskoi. 


310  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

In  the  element  of  the  party  to  which  he  belongs  are  found 
nearly  all  the  original  founders  of  the  movement  and  those  who 
have  made  the  largest  sacrifices  for  its  benefit.  The  party 
has  two  very  capable  women  members,  the  Countess  Bobrinsky 
and  Mme.  Turkov,  two  unprejudiced,  and  I  believe  most 
intelligent,  observers  of  the  situation  within  the  party.  The 
former  in  a  conversation  with  me  called  Shakovskoi  the  heart 
of  the  whole  moderate  movement ;  the  latter  has  given  him  the 
title  of  "the  fisher  of  souls,"  claiming  that  it  was  he,  before  any 
one  else,  who  brought  into  the  movement  its  most  valuable  and 
devoted  members.  Prince  Shakovskoi  is  still  in  the  party  and 
likely  to  remain  there.  Besides  being  one  of  its  very  first 
organisers,  he  was  the  secretary  of  the  first  Duma.  In  contrast 
with  Milyoukov,  in  the  opinion  of  several  party  leaders  with 
whom  I  conversed,  he  is  a  democrat  always,  while  in  the  past, 
like  many  other  moderates,  he  has  been  not  only  friendly 
toward,  but  actively  interested  in,  the  whole  revolutionary 
movement.  Perhaps  he  and  the  other  leaders  of  his  type  are 
hardly  such  prominent  characters  as  Milyoukov,  but  instead  of 
being  viewed  with  suspicion  even  by  many  members  of  their 
own  organisation,  they  are  loved  and  respected  by  all. 

Professor  Milyoukov,  however,  has  long  been  the  chief  figure 
in  his  party  and  is  so  well  known  abroad  that  it  has  been 
necessary  to  define  his  position  with  the  utmost  clearness,  to 
show  definitely  why  he  is  so  unpopular  in  his  own  country,  and 
to  show  that  he  is  not  a  leader  of  any  large  part  of  the  Russian 
nation.  His  leadership,  his  and  his  followers'  opinion  that  their 
party  can  accomplish  something  *' legally''  under  a  government 
which  recognises  no  law,  has  led  only  to  the  miserable  fiasco 
of  the  organisation. 

One  Anierican  editor,  at  least,  writing  in  the  New  York 
Globe  of  January  14,  1908,  has  grasped  the  situation  so  clearly 
that  his  words  deserve  to  be  quoted.  They  are  in  part  as 
follows: 

Milyoukov  is  an  absolute  parliamentarian  —  now.  Revolutionary 
activity  is  as  foreign  to  his  programme  as  to  the  minds  of  most  stable 
Americans;  hence  in  him  Americans  recognise  a  kindred  spirit,  a  cham- 
pion of  the  fundamental  principles  of  human  liberty  and  human  justice 
that  we  ourselves  won  a  century  and  a  quarter  ago.  Milyoukov 's  aims 
are  our  ideals  and  our  fixed  standards.     Milyoukov 's  tactics  and  methods 


BEGGING  FOR  CRUMBS  311 

to-day  in  Russia  are  precisely  our  tactics  and  methods.  So  it  develops 
that  the  very  elements  in  Milyoukov's  policy  that  appeal  to  a  greater 
number  of  Americans  than  the  policy  of  any  other  Russian  who  has  ever 
come  to  us,  also  alienate  him  from  a  vast  section  of  Russia  —  the  element 
that  believes  that  Russia's  freedom  must  eventually  be  purchased  by 
precisely  the  same  means  as  our  freedom  was  purchased.  The  shackles 
of  slavery  were  not  struck  off  by  act  of  Congress.  The  rule  of  taxation 
without  representation  was  not  ended  by  act  of  Parliament.  The  tyran- 
ny of  the  Czars,  the  incredible  oppression  of  autocracy,  may  cease  through 
the  legislative  efforts  of  the  Duma,  but  a  large  section  of  the  Russian 
people  fear  not.     Milyoukov  represents  the  optimistic  minority. 

Last  winter  it  was  our  privilege  to  welcome  and  listen  to  two  other 
Russians  whose  stirring  appeals  moved  many  thousands  of  our  people. 
One  of  these  men  —  Nicholas  Tchaykovsky  —  now  lies  in  the  grim  old 
fortress  of  SS.  Peter  and  Paul,  while  the  other  —  Alexis  Aladdin  —  has 
been  obliged  to  remain  in  exile  from  his  native  land.  Such  are  the 
penalties  these  two  brave  men  are  paying  for  their  appeal  to  America  — 
not  for  material  support,  but  for  sympathy  and  understanding.  [They 
are  paying  these  penalties  rather  for  other  and  greater  services  to  their 
country.] 

Wherever  Tchaykovsky  and  Aladdin  journeyed  in  this  country  they 
were  introduced  as  representatives  of  "two  of  the  great  parties  of  Rus- 
sia's liberal  movement."  In  Professor  Milyoukov  we  have  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  third  and  last  great  party  of  progress  .  .  .  Tchay- 
kovsky was  frankly  a  revolutionist.  He  believed  that  constitutional 
government  could  be  permanently  established  only  through  fighting. 
Aladdin  based  his  hopes  on  the  parliament,  but  held  armed  resistance 
in  the  background  as  an  ultimate  resource  —  trusted  in  God  and  the 
Czar,  but  kept  his  powder  dry,  as  it  were.  Milyoukov  stakes  everything 
on  the  parliament.  He  stands  ready  to  compromise  everything  save 
the  merest  forms  of  parliamentary  government.  "Half  a  loaf  is  better 
than  no  bread,"  according  to  the  old  adage.  ** Crumbs  are  better  than 
nothing  when  there  is  small  hope  for  even  the  half  loaf,"  says  Milyoukov. 

But  what  crumbs  he  has  obtained  he  has  gotten  only  by 
abject  humiliation  and  the  betrayal  of  former  principles.  A 
party  that  only  begs  for  crumbs  has  no  longer  any  claim  to  be 
considered  a  part  of  a  great  emancipation  movement. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SOCIALISTS 

THE  masses  of  the  Russian  people  took  the  dissolution 
of  the  first  Duma  far  more  seriously  than  did  the 
moderate  parties.  This  act  of  the  Czar's  had  the  same  electrical 
effect  on  the  peasantry  that  the  massacres  of  January  22,  1905, 
in  St.  Petersburg,  had  on  the  working  people.  The  outraged 
nation  expressed  in  the  second  elections  an  opinion  so  radical 
that  a  national  unity  on  the  basis  of  the  comparatively  moderate 
Viborg  manifesto  was  no  longer  possible.  While  the  moderate 
party  was  becoming  more  moderate  the  population  was  becoming 
more  revolutionary. 

In  spite  of  the  election  law  that  favoured  the  reactionary 
and  moderate  parties  and  the  arbitrary  actions  of  the  police  in 
many  provinces  where  they  openly  robbed  the  democrats  of  their 
victories,  the  second  Duma  came  within  an  ace  of  being  an 
outright  Socialist  body.  Out  of  twenty  million  voters  the 
results  showed  that  at  least  fifteen  million  had  voted  for 
revolutionary  and  Socialistic  organisations,  which  having  been 
tested  in  the  first  Duma  were  thoroughly  well  known  to  the 
people  for  what  they  really  were.  Of  the  other  five  million 
votes  the  majority  went  to  revolutionary  nationalist  parties, 
such  as  those  of  the  Poles,  the  Caucasians,  the  Letts,  the 
Tartars,  and  the  Armenians.  Only  a  million  or  two  at  the 
outside  cast  their  votes  for  moderate  and  reactionary  parties. 
A  majority  of  the  people  then  voted  for  recognised  Socialist 
candidates,  and  an  overwhelming  majority  for  revolutionists. 

If  we  take  into  account  +he  fact  that  the  delegations  from 
several  provinces,  according  to  the  Duma's  decisions,  had 
been  stolen  by  the  officials,  we  can  say  that  the  majority  of 
the  deputies  actually  legally  elected  were  Socialists  and 
revolutionists.  This  is  a  very  remarkable  result  when  we 
consider  that  the   election  law  made   one  landlord  equal  to 

312 


THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SOCIALISTS  313:. 

several  hundred  peasants,  gave  the  middle  class  voter  of  the 
cities  a  voting  power  equal  to  half  a  hundred  peasants,  and 
allotted  to  the  working  people  a  proportion  of  the  electors^ 
scarcely  better  than  that  of  the  peasantry  themselves. 

After  the  warning  the  Government  had  already  received 
at  the  first  elections,  we  may  wonder  that  it  did  not  put  into- 
effect  its  coup  d'etat  before  these  second  elections.  It  decided 
to  try  to  obtain  a  docile  Duma  by  police  measures  without 
breaking  its  solemn  pledge  to  maintain  the  law,  so  as  to  satisfy 
the  foreign  money-lenders,  on  whom  Russia  is  so  dependent, 
that  the  country  was  really  entering  into  a  modern  parliamentary 
form  of  government. 

The  outrages  committed  by  the  police  went  so  far  that  some 
of  them  were  even  branded  by  Russia's  highest  courts  —  after 
the  second  Duma  had  already  been  dissolved.  This  was  the  case 
with  the  candidates  Hellat  and  Pold  who  were  thus  robbed  of 
their  seats  from  the  Baltic  Provinces.  The  elections  in  the 
province  of  Minsk  were  quashed  by  the  St.  Petersburg 
authorities  without  the  slightest  reason.  They  acted  at  the 
suggestion  of  the  notorious  Schmidt,  whom  I  have  already 
mentioned  and  who  has  now  become  an  outcast  even  from 
the  reactionary  parties.  One  of  the  candidates  so  elected  and 
illegally  thrown  out  was  Isaac  Hourwich,  long  resident  in  the 
United  States  and  known  there  by  his  economic  writings.  In  the 
government  of  Kiev,  the  Central  Government  struck  off 
thirteen  thousand  voters  from  the  lists  because  their  apartments 
did  not  correspond  to  on  official's  idea  of  a  home  as  specified  in 
the  law.  Newspapers  were  confiscated  for  merely  giving  the 
lists  of  electors,  and  in  the  province  of  Vladimir  they  were 
forbidden  even  to  mention  political  questions.  That  a  very 
large  Socialist  minority  was  elected  in  spite  of  all  these  measures 
shows  unmistakably  the  strong  and  irresistibly  Socialist  and 
revolutionary  current  in  Russian  opinion. 

Of  the  majority  of  the  deputies  elected  by  the  masses  of  the 
people  over  a  hundred  were  members  of  the  so-called  *'  Labour 
Group."  founded  by  Aladdin,  Anikine,and  others  in  the  first 
Duma.  There  can  be  no  question  that  a  universal  suffrage  law, 
as  demanded  even  by  the  moderate  opposition  parties,  would 
have  given  to  the  Labour  Group  a  majority  of  the  whole  Duma. 


314  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Almost  equally  important  were  the  democratic  parties  which 
use  the  Socialist  conception  as  the  basis  of  their  programme  and 
in  the  title  of  their  organisation,  the  Socialist  Revolutionary, 
the  Social  Democratic  and  the  National  Socialist  parties,  which 
combined  also  returned  more  than  a  hundred  members.  In 
the  first  Duma  these  organisations  had  had  only  twenty  deputies, 
in  the  second  Duma  they  had  approximately  one  hundred  and 
twenty.  While  the  moderate  Socialist  "Labour  Group"  had 
doubled  its  representation,  the  still  more  revolutionary  and 
wholly  Socialist  parties  had  increased  theirs  sixfold. 

After  these  elections  it  is  unnecessary  for  a  true  democrat  to 
give  any  further  consideration  to  the  Constitutional  Demo- 
cratic party.  Doubtless  the  middle-class  electors  were  dis- 
satisfied with  the  party  for  the  reasons  I  have  already  stated, 
but  there  is  a  more  deep-seated  reason  separating  the  conser- 
vative element  of  the  moderate  party  now  in  control  of  the  party 
from  the  masses  of  the  people.  Before  the  first  Duma  met 
Aladdin  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  large  majority 
of  the  Constitutional  Democrats  elected  were  landlords  and 
that  the  peasants  had  no  deep  confidence  in  the  liberalism  of 
any  part  of  the  class  whose  estates  they  proposed  to  expro- 
priate. We  must  remember  always  with  the  peasants  that  the 
fathers  of  these  men,  however  liberal,  had  been  slave-owners  and 
the  older  of  them  had  themselves  been  masters  of  white  slave 
servants  in  their  youth  or  childhood. 

The  peoples'  underlying  distrust  of  the  Constitutional  Demo- 
crats has  its  counterpart  in  the  Constitutional  Democrats' 
distrust  of  the  people.  They  have  constantly  doubted  the 
peasant's  capacity  and  have  even  regarded  him  as  a  savage 
by  nature.  It  is  not  only  a  lack  of  faith  but  a  lack  of  scien- 
tific observation,  true  sympathy,  and  understanding,  that  marks 
this  patronising  and  imdemocratic  organisation.  I  do  not 
imply  that  the  leaders  of  the  movement  are  governed  by  their 
interests  as  landlords,  but  I  do  assert  it  as  a  profound  belief  that 
they  have  not  lost  entirely  the  slave-owner's  psychology,  and 
I  know  that  the  people's  true  leaders  share  this  view.  -The 
democracy  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic  party  is  patro- 
nising and  tinged  with  a  sort  of  benevolent  feudalism.  Their 
constitutionalism,  taken  largely  from  the  professors  and  the- 


THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SOCIALISTS  315 

oretical  publicists  among  them,  is  of  a  purely  logical  order  — 
uninspired  as  it  is  by  knowledge,  love,  or  faith,  it  is  no  wonder 
that  it  has  broken  down  in  the  great  crisis. 

It  is  interesting  to  observe  that  the  several  million  votes 
given  to  the  nationalist  parties  were  on  the  whole  more  favour- 
able to  the  Socialist  than  to  the  moderate  standpoint.  The 
Polish  situation  is  so  complicated  that  it  could  only  be  properly 
analysed  in  a  work  apart  and  it  is  best  not  to  endeavour  to 
explain  it  here  at  all.  The  Tartars,  even  a  more  important 
element  niunerically  in  Russia's  population,  numbering  as  they 
do  more  than  fifteen  millions,  furnish  a  less  complicated  prob- 
lem. I  shall  touch  on  them  only  as  an  illustration,  leaving  aside 
the  Poles  and  the  Armenians,  Georgians,  Letts,  Esths,  and 
other  minor  but  not  imimportant  nationalities. 

The  Mussulman  group  in  the  second  Duma  had  thirty-one 
members,  enough  to  hold  the  balance  of  power.  Until  the 
close  of  the  Duma  this  organisation  was  outwardly  allied  with 
the  moderate  parties,  but  there  are  elements  in  its  programme 
and  its  tactics  at  this  moment  which  justify  the  belief  that  its 
position  was  far  more  radical  than  the  moderates',  and  that  it 
would  soon  have  forsaken  the  alliance.  I  talked  with  a  leading 
member  who  stated  that  his  group  had  decided  to  vote  for  a  full 
political  amnesty  and  not  only  for  a  partial  one  as  the  moderates 
had  proposed.  In  the  important  land  question  also  the  position 
of  this  party  was  nearer  to  that  of  the  "Labour  Group"  than 
to  the  moderates.  Among  other  of  the  Mussulman  principles 
was  that  no  compensation  was  to  be  paid  for  lands  that  had 
been  made  as  a  gift  by  the  Government  to  former  officials.  As 
such  lands  form  a  very  considerable  part  of  the  whole  nobility's 
possessions,  a  measure  embodying  this  principle  would  have 
brought  on  a  most  violent  conflict.  Another  important  item 
of  the  Mussulman  programme  was  that  the  people's  representa- 
tives should  demand  the  right  of  legislating,  not  only  within 
the  bounds  laid  down  by  the  Czar,  but  also  concerning  the 
so-called  "fundamental  laws,"  which  is  as  much  as  to  say 
that  the  party  favoured  turning  the  Duma  into  a  constitutional 
assembly. 

It  is  probable,  then,  even  without  taking  into  consideration 
that  a  large  part  of  the  reactionary  members  had  no  right  to 


3i6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

their  seats,  that  the  second  Duma  did  not  really  have  a  moderate 
majority.  It  is  probable  that  it  was  dissolved  by  the  Govern- 
ment just  before  it  had  time  to  show  to  the  world  its  true 
revolutionary  character. 

In  the  Viborg  manifesto  the  revolutionary  proposals  were 
largely  of  a  political  nature.  The  deputies  of  the  majority 
of  the  nation  in  the  second  Duma  were  in  favour  of  a  social 
revolutionary  programme.  The  social  revolution  which  the 
masses  of  the  people  had  united  to  demand  was  concerned  prin- 
cipally with  the  land  question.  On  the  other  social  questions 
a  certain  part  even  of  the  revolutionary  deputies  might  be  called 
mere  radicals,  on  the  land  question  they  were  Socialists.  All 
the  parties  which  had  any  claim  to  represent  the  peasant 
majority  of  the  nation  were  in  favour  of  the  State  expropriating, 
with  or  without  compensation,  all  the  land  belonging  to  the 
nobility  and  the  wealthy  classes,  of  creating  out  of  this  land 
a  national  land  fund,  and  of  giving  either  to  individual  peasants, 
to  villages,  or  to  other  local  government  bodies,  a  permanent 
right  to  share  in  this  fund.  The  proposed  measure  was  not 
like  the  land  grants  made  to  settlers  by  the  United  States 
Government.  In  America  there  was  at  first  too  much  land 
and  not  enough  settlers.  In  Russia  there  is  not  enough  land 
for  the  people.  It  is  therefore  proposed  by  all  the  popular 
parties  not  to  divide  the  land  permanently  into  private  property, 
but  either  to  lease  it  for  long  terms  to  individuals,  or  to  leave 
it  in  the  hands  of  the  villagers  or  of  local  governments  to  dis- 
pose of  as  they  will  according  to  some  plan  arranged  by  the 
National  Representative  Assembly. 

It  is  recognised  by  all  the  popular  and  Socialistic  parties 
that  this  programme  amounts  to  a  social  revolution,  and  that 
the  Government  can  only  be  forced  to  grant  the  programme 
either  by  a  general  insurrection  or  by  continued  agrarian  rebel- 
lions which  it  will  be  unable  to  repress.  Stolypine  said  to  the 
Duma;  "You  shall  not  frighten  the  Government,  for  it  has 
behind  it  the  physical  power."  "Behind  us,"  said  Karaviev, 
a  leader  of  the  Labour  Group,  "are  justice,  science,  and  a  hundred 
million  peasants,  four-fifths  of  the  population  of  the  Empire." 

On  the  land  question,  when  it  became  acute  in  the  discussions 
of  the   second   Dtuna,   the   Constitutional   Democrats  entirely 


THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SCXIALISTS  317 

failed  to  satisfy  the  people's  representatives.  Ex-Minister 
Kutler,  their  leader,  while  confessing  that  many  interests  of 
society  were  above  that  of  private  property,  reached  in  his 
argument  only  that  degree  of  radicalism  attained  many  years  ago 
all  over  the  world  by  the  opponents  of  "absentee"  landlordism. 
Passing  lightly  over  the  historic  wrongs  under  which  the  peas- 
ants are  suffering,  the  only  evil  he  saw  was  that  certain  land- 
lords should  draw  an  income  from  their  estates  without  really 
taking  part  in  their  management.  His  party  did  not  ask  that 
any  of  the  other  great  wrongs  which  were  crushing  the  Russian 
peasantry  should  be  redressed.  The  party  proposed  to  pay  for 
the  land  to  be  expropriated  for  the  peasants'  benefit  a  sum  less 
than  its  present  artificial  market  value,  but  it  wished  the  starv- 
ing peasantry  themselves  to  pay  half  of  this  sum. 

All  of  the  popular  groups  took  a  more  advanced  position. 
At  first  glance  it  might  appear  that  the  Social  Democrats,  who 
were  looking  forward  in  the  future  not  to  the  growth  of  small 
farms  in  Russia  but  rather  to  their  gradual  absorption  by  large 
estates  even  after  the  expropriation,  were  taking  up  a  more 
conservative  position  than  the  Constitutional  Democrats,  who 
rather  expected  to  see  the  new  small  properties  now  to  be 
instituted  becoming  a  permanent  feature  of  Russian  agriculture. 
However,  the  Social  Democrats  did  not  want  the  peasants, 
or  even  the  Government,  to  pay  anything  to  the  landlords  for 
the  expropriated  property,  while  the  Constitutional  Democrats 
voted  in  committee  with  the  most  violent  reactionaries  and 
secured  a  majority  in  favour  of  compensation.  The  Constitu- 
tional Democratic  position  was  dictated  both  by  a  desire  to 
please  the  landlords  and  a  lack  of  true  contact  with  the  peasantry 
—  that  of  the  Social  Democrats  was  derived  solely  from  a  dis- 
trust of  the  peasants.  Primarily  a  city  workingmen's  party, 
this  organisation  does  not  believe  in  the  permanence  of  the 
peasants'  Socialist  tendencies,  but  considers  that  the  peasants 
will  soon  be  satisfied  with  imrestricted  private  property,  and 
considers  that  they  play  also  a  secondary  rdle  in  the  revolution 
—  that  the  peasant  disorders,  in  the  words  of  their  spokesman, 
Zeretelly,  were  only  an  echo  of  the  emancipation  movement  in 
the  towns. 

In  spite  of  their  skepticism  in  regard  to  the  peasants'  Social- 


3i8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

ism  and  revolutionism,  however,  the  majority  of  this  party 
has  forced  a  somewhat  conservative  minority  to  a  friendly 
position  toward  other  Socialist  parties  that  stand  nearer  to 
the  peasants.  The  party  does  not  believe,  with  one  of  the 
landlord  speakers  in  the  Dimia,  that  the  peasants  are  an  ignorant 
herd  that  cannot  be  left  without  a  nobleman  pastor.  It  is 
genuinely  democratic  and  understands  that  the  peasants  must 
be  allowed  to  decide  their  questions  for  themselves.  It  urges 
only  against  the  other  popular  parties  that  a  national  land  fimd 
entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  centralised  State  might  prove 
dangerous  to  the  people's  interest  because  it  might  increase 
the  power  of  an  undemocratic  government.  It  proposes, 
therefore,  that  the  distribution  of  the  land  be  left  entirely  in 
the  hands  of  local  government  organisations,  the  provinces^, 
districts,  and  towns.  It  also  objects  to  making  those  small 
properties,  relatively  few,  that  are  now  in  the  hands  of  individual 
peasants  a  part  of  the  national  land  fund,  on  the  ground  that 
this  class  of  small  farmers  would  become  hostile  and  dangerous- 
to  the  success  of  the  revolutionary  movement.  The  party 
suggests  that  the  local  government  should  either  rent  the  land 
to  the  peasantry,  or  operate  it  itself  in  the  form  of  large  estates,, 
or  divide  it  finally  among  the  peasants. 

It  is  principally  the  present  form  of  communal  property  in 
the  villages  that  this  organisation  opposes,  the  very  fornn 
favoured  by  the  rival  organisation,  the  Socialist  Revolutionary 
Party,  on  the  grounds  that  it  is  the  historic  Russian  land  institu- 
tion. We  need  not  anticipate,  however,  a  serious  conflict,, 
as  both  parties  are  entirely  democratic  in  their  principles, 
and  will  leave  the  question  to  be  decided  finally  by  the  people 
themselves.  Certainly  the  Social  Democrats,  who  consider 
these  communes  not  an  advanced  but  a  retarded  form  of  land 
ownership  holding  back  the  full  modem  exploitation  of  the  land,, 
and  consider  them  the  genesis  of  large  estates  and  of  property- 
less  agricultural  labourers,  cannot  refuse  to  allow  the  peasants 
to  try  this  form  of  property  if  they  wish.  On  the  other  hand 
the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  cannot  refuse  to  give  the 
local  authorities,  duly  elected  by  the  peasantry,  full  power  tO' 
give  over  the  land  into  private  property  or  administer  it  mtmi- 
cipally  if  they  so  decide.     When  at  the  beginning  of  the  first 


THE  PEASANTS   BECOME    SOCIALISTS  319. 

Duma  I  asked  Aladdin,  of  the  Labour  Group,  whether  his 
organisation  favoured  communal  ownership,  he  answered: 
"We  favour  leaving  this  question  to  the  peasants  themselves. 
Certainly  we  are  not  going  to  send  Cossacks  and  machine  guns 
to  any  locality  to  enforce  either  communal  or  private  property." 

The  proposal  which  must  shock  most  the  earnest  believers 
in  private  property  is  that  of  confiscating  without  compensa- 
tion, as  proposed  by  the  Socialists,  or  without  full  compensation 
as  proposed  by  the  Constitutional  Democrats.  But  the  argu- 
ments used  in  the  Duma  would  convince  any  broad-minded  and 
disinterested  hearer.  Zeretelly  called  attention  to  the  punish- 
ment expeditions,  which,  in  burning  homes,  villages,  bombarding 
houses  and  whole  city  districts,  had  ignored  private  property 
in  every  part  of  the  country.  He  might  also  have  spoken  of 
the  wholesale  confiscation  of  estates  by  the  Government  for 
purely  political  reasons.  He  looked  on  these  Government 
confiscations  as  a  war  measure  and  declared  his  party  answered 
by  proposing  the  destruction  of  the  present  State,  to  its  very 
bureaucratic  and  landlord  foundations.  A  deputy  from  Little 
Russia  reminded  the  Duma  how  the  Government  had  given 
away  to  court  favourites  twenty-five  million  acres  of  land  that 
had  been  the  property  of  the  Cossack  population  who  had  won 
it  from  the  Turks  and  Tartars  at  the  cost  of  innumerable  lives. 
At  the  same  time  that  this  property  was  confiscated  by  the 
Czar  the  free  population  of  this  part  of  Russia  was  the  first 
time  sold   into  serfdom,  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century! 

The  members  of  the  more  moderate  Labour  Group  were  in 
favour  of  fair  compensation  by  the  State,  but  the  majority 
were  persuaded  that  the  peasants  themselves,  who  had  been 
forced  by  the  Government  to  pay  an  exorbitant  price  for  their 
own  lands  and  also  for  the  mere  fact  of  their  emancipation, 
should  pay  nothing.  The  landlords  then  were  to  be  rewarded 
by  such  payments  only  as  a  democratic  government  could 
afford,  which  wotdd  have  as  its  principal  source  of  income 
from  taxation  only  the  middle  and  upper  classes. 

The  solution  of  the  land  question  proposed  by  this,  the  most 
important  group  in  the  second  Duma,  lies  in  some  respects 
between  the  Social  Revolutionary  and  Social  Democrats 
proposals    already    mentioned.      With    the   Social    Democrats 


^2o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  Labour  Group  does  not  wish  to  expropriate  the  small  prop- 
erties of  peasants  who  have  already  won  for  themselves  a 
sufficient  amount  of  land  to  fully  occupy  all  their  labour.  With 
the  Social  Revolutionists  it  proposes  that  all  private  sales, 
mortgages  and  other  deals  in  land  shall  be  immediately  and 
permanently  put  an  end  to,  while  the  Social  Democrats  would 
leave  this  question  wholly  in  the  hands  of  the  local  government 
to  decide  in  either  way.  In  another  aspect  of  the  question 
the  position  of  the  Labour  Group,  which  can  best  claim  to 
represent  the  peasantry,  is  still  more  diametrically  opposed  to 
that  of  the  Social  Democrats.  The  Social  Democrats  welcome 
the  Government's  measure  which  allows  every  peasant  share- 
holder in  the  common  property  of  the  villages  to  sell  off  his 
share  as  his  private  property.  This  measure  favours  those 
peasants  who,  not  finding  sufficient  occupation  in  the  villages, 
have  drifted  to  the  towns.  By  this  law  they  can  demand  their 
property  and  sell  it  immediately  to  some  well-to-do  peasant, 
leaving  the  village  that  much  poorer  in  the  future.  However 
hard  on  the  peasants  remaining  in  the  village,  this  measure 
■cannot  but  be  welcomed  by  the  workingmen  owners.  Acting 
on  the  contrary  principle,  the  Labour  Group  demands  that  in 
the  allotment  of  the  new  lands  to  be  taken  from  the  proprietors 
the  agricultural  population  be  first  provided  for. 

The  arguments  used  by  the  present  deputies  in  support  of 
the  proposed  expropriation  were  of  the  most  revolutionary 
character.  "Do  you  really  think."  asked  one,  "that  you  will 
succeed  for  a  moment  in  convincing  the  peasants,  whose  fathers, 
brothers  and  children's  lives  have  been  expropriated  by  the 
Government  without  their  consent,  that  this  cannot  and  must 
not  be  done  with  the  land?"  This  militant  challenge  was 
greeted  with  a  storm  of  applause.  Another  said,  "We  know 
from  experience  of  one  sacred  form  of  inviolable  property — it 
was  the  peasantry  themselves  who  were  kept  in  slavery.  .  .  . 
Do  you  landlords  sitting  here  think  that  we  do  not  remember 
that  you  used  to  bet  us  on  cards  and  exchange  us  for  hunting 
dogs!  (Thunderous  applause.)  .  .  .  Once  the  people  ipake 
up  their  minds  to  it  there  is  nothing  sacred.  .  .  .  You  say 
your  property  is  sacred  and  inviolable,  I  will  tell  you  one  thing, 
that  we  will  never  purchase  it;  the  peasants  that  sent  me  here 


THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SOCIALISTS  321 

told  me  to  tell  you  the  land  is  ours ;  we  do  not  want  to  buy  it, 
but  to  take  it." 

If  in  the  question  nearest  the  peasant's  heart,  the  land  question, 
he  could  expect  nothing  from  the  Government,  the  same  is 
true  also  with  the  other  great  social  questions  referring  to  the 
peasant's  economic,  moral  or  intellectual  situation.  The  same 
Government  which  robs  its  peasants  of  the  land,  so  essential 
for  their  very  existence,  secures  one  half  of  its  own  income 
from  the  promotion  of  drunkenness  among  them,  and  spends 
most  of  this  income  on  armament  and  wars  for  conquest  and 
almost  nothing  at  all  on  popular  education,  which  it  calls  a 
"luxury."  Alexinsky  showed  to  the  Duma  that  the  United 
States  spends  twelve  times  as  much  per  person.  Education 
takes  only  2  or  3  per  cent,  of  the  total  expenditure  of  the 
Central  Government  and  only  a  relatively  small  proportion  of 
that  of  the  local  government  bodies.  A  few  years  ago  there 
was  a  movement  among  these  organisations  to  improve  the 
schools;  in  1900  the  Government  shut  off  their  principal  source 
of  income  and  put  the  improvement  to  an  end. 

The  school  system  is  at  an  incredibly  low  level.  The  teachers* 
salaries  range  between  one  himdred  and  two  hundred  rubles 
a  year  (from  fifty  dollars  to  one  hundred  dollars);  the  highest 
are  about  five  hundred  rubles,  and  hundreds  of  teachers  are 
paid  even  less  than  one  hundred.  In  those  provinces  where 
the  landlords  are  relatively  powerful,  education  is  at  its  worst 
and  the  proportion  of  literates  in  the  population  is  sometimes 
as  low  as  one-fifth.  In  general  the  situation  is  not  quite  so 
bad.  One-half  of  the  young  men  are  now  literate,  though  of 
those  of  middle  age,  who  suffered  from  the  still  worse  conditions 
of  the  last  generation,  only  one-fourth  can  read  and  write. 
Worst  of  all  is  the  condition  of  the  women.  For  many  years 
less  than  5  per  cent,  reaching  maturity  could  read  and  write; 
the  proportion  has  now  risen,  but  only  to  about  one-eighth  of 
the  total.  While  this  situation  is  bad  enough,  and  a  terrible 
accusation  against  such  an  extravagant  government  as  that 
of  Russia,  it  must  not  be  exaggerated.  We  must  notice  that 
half  of  the  present  generation  of  young  men  in  the  country 
read  and  write,  and  that  the  proportion  in  the  cities  is  very 
much  higher.     This  condition  is  certainly  better  than  that  of 


322  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  people  of  the  western  part  of  the  United  States  a  few  genera- 
tions ago,  when  no  one  questioned  the  capacity  of  the  people 
of  this  part  of  the  country  for  intelligent  self-government.  Yet 
it  is  a  disgrace  to  Russia,  which  did  not  spend  as  much  for  the 
elementary  schools  of  the  whole  Empire  in  1 900  —  fifty  million 
rubles  — as  did  the  city  of  New  York  alone  (if  we  take  into 
account  the  expenditure  for  school  grounds,  rents  and  buildings). 
But  the  official  organ  of  the  Russian  Government,  the  Rossia, 
stated  recently  that  the  proposed  paltry  increase  of  expendi- 
ture of  seven  million  rubles  on  the  schools  was  a  luxury!  The 
peasants  see  that  they  will  only  get  good  schools  when  they 
have  conquered  the  Czar. 

The  Russian  Government  is  now  making  a  net  profit  every 
year  of  five  hundred  million  rubles  on  the  nation's  drink  bill. 
The  peasants  are  not  very  heavy  drinkers  compared  with  other 
nations,  but  unfortunately  they  drink  in  spells.  Depressed 
by  their  always  impending  economic  ruin,  starving  in  times 
of  famine  and  confined  to  village  drudgery  by  their  extreme 
poverty,  they  occasionally  take  refuge  in  drink.  However, 
the  consumption  of  alcohol  per  capita  was  falling  rapidly  in 
the  last  generation,  till  the  Government  took  up  the  monopoly 
of  the  business.  Before  1880  the  people  were  consuming  four 
litres  per  year  per  head;  in  the  years  immediately  before  the 
asstimption  of  the  business  by  the  State  (1897)  the  constmiption 
had  already  fallen  to  two  and  a  half.  Before  the  opening  of 
the  State  saloons  every  village  had  a  right  by  the  vote  of  the 
majority  to  shut  up  the  local  public  houses;  not  only  is  this 
no  longer  tolerated  since  the  Government  has  assumed  control, 
but,  as  we  have  seen,  any  village  that  even  passes  a  resolution 
to  boycott  the  liquor  store  is  heavily  fined  by  the  local  czars. 
Before  the  institution  of  the  Government  monopoly  the  elected 
village  authorities  used  to  extract  large  sums  of  money  for  the 
relief  of  local  needs  whenever  a  licence  was  granted.  In  one 
province  the  total  sum  so  paid  to  the  villages  amounted  to  one 
million  rubles,  a  tremendous  amount  to  a  pauper  population. 
After  the  institution  of  the  Government  monopoly  the,  value 
of  alcohol  consumed  doubled  within  five  years,  rising  from 
254,000,000  to  504,000,000  rubles  (in  1906)  and  the  amount 
also  rapidly  increased. 


THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SOCIALISTS  323 

At  the  present  moment  the  Government  and  the  reactionaries 
are  making  a  great  pretence  of  conducting  a  campaign  against 
the  drink  evil.  As  it  is  obvious  that  the  success  of  such  a 
campaign  would  ruin  the  Government  one  must  doubt  its 
sincerity. 

Even  in  the  third  Duma  a  moderate  peasant  leader  had  the 
courage  to  denounce  the  Government  and  the  Duma's  position 
on  this  question.  Immediately  after  Stoly pine's  declaration 
at  the  opening  of  the  Duma,  he  arose  and,  gazing  severely  at 
the  astonished  premier,  cried  out  in  stentorian  tones:  "I  am 
amazed  to  have  heard  nothing  from  his  Excellency  about  the 
most  important,  the  most  vital  question  in  Russia  —  the  drink 
question  .  .  .  Drink  kills  Russia  .  .  .  You  speak  of 
the  hopeful  condition  of  the  State  finance,  but  your  budget  is 
built  up  of  the  poison  given  to  the  people,  upon  the  poisoning 
of  its  vital  forces  by  drink  encouraged  for  financial  purposes.'* 
So  obviously  just  was  every  word  this  peasant  said,  and  on  the 
face  of  it  so  removed  from  any  political  revolutionism,  that  a 
large  part  of  the  Duma  cheered  the  speaker  and  listened  to  him 
attentively  afterward  every  time  he  brought  up  the  question. 
The  whole  Duma  has  decided  that  something  ought  to  be  done 
about  the  drink  question,  but  nothing  in  Russian  politics  is  more 
certain  than  that  no  serious  reform  will  be  accomplished  without 
revolution.  The  moral  deterioration  of  the  masses  of  the  people 
is  as  much  a  matter  of  indifference  to  the  Government  and  to 
the  landlords  as  are  their  intellectual  and  physical  starvation. 

In  view  of  the  hopelessness  of  getting  the  Government  or 
landlords  to  do  anything  on  any  of  these  vital  social  questions, 
in  view  of  the  contempt  in  which  the  peasants  know  they  are 
held  by  the  ruling  classes,  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  they 
have  lost  all  interest  in  the  Duma,  and  that  in  many  parts  of 
Russia  all  the  parties  representing  them  decided  to  have  nothing 
to  do  with  the  third  election  which  placed  the  Duma  entirely  in 
the  landlords'  hands  while  leaving  it  as  helplessly  in  the  power 
of  the  Government  as  before.  By  the  coup  d'etat  of  the  3d  of 
June,  1907,  the  electors  of  the  workingmen,  the  peasants,  and 
of  the  non-privileged  and  poorer  part  of  the  city  middle  classes, 
were  reduced  to  one-half  of  their  former  number,  while  those  of 
the   landlords    were   increased   30   per   cent.     This   left    the 


324  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

majority  of  the  provinces  of  Russia  entirely  in  the  landlords' 
power,  and  nearly  all  the  rest  in  the  hands  of  the  landlords  in 
combination  with  the  richest  class  of  the  city  electors,  who  had 
been  given  by  the  new  law  a  right  to  vote  apart  not  only  from 
the  workingmen,  but  also  from  the  majority  of  the  middle  classes. 

The  Constitutional  Democrats  complained  of  this  new  law, 
and  it  is  true  that  their  power,  compared  to  that  of  the  reaction- 
aries, was  very  much  decreased,  but  at  the  same  time  they 
suffered  far  less  than  the  workingman  and  the  peasant.  In 
the  third  Duma  the  Constitutional  Democrats  and  groups  allied 
to  them  have  about  one-fourth  of  all  the  deputies,  whereas  in 
the  second  Duma  they  had  about  one-half;  the  peasants'  and 
workingmen 's  parties,  on  the  other  hand,  which  also  had  nearly 
one-half  of  the  deputies  of  the  second  Duma,  have  less  than 
one-eighth  of  those  in  the  third.  Under  the  new  law  a  landlord 
has  the  vote  of  about  ten  ordinary  citizens,  but  every  such 
citizen  has  the  vote  of  fifty  peasants,  and  of  more  than  fifty 
workingmen.  We  can  see,  then,  that  the  injustice  done  to  the 
masses  of  the  people  is  much  greater  than  that  done  to  the 
classes  from  which  the  moderate  party  secures  nearly  all  its 
votes,  and  this  accounts  largely  for  the  relative  satisfaction 
of  the  latter  with  the  third  Duma. 

The  real  distribution  of  political  power  in  Russia  is  better 
shown  by  the  fact  that  any  two  landlords  had  the  same  voice 
in  the  elections  for  the  third  Duma  as  any  thousand  peasants. 
We  must  not  forget  also  that  in  case  the  Duma,  should  by  any 
chance  happen  to  displease  the  Government  in  any  way,  the 
latter  has  the  power  to  reduce  it  to  a  nullity.  The  people  would 
perhaps  have  distrusted  the  third  Duma  on  this  accoimt  alone, 
even  if  the  election  law  had  remained  unchanged,  but  when 
the  relative  voting  power  of  their  enemy,  the  landlords,  was 
increased  several  fold  all  over  Russia,  they  lost  their  interest 
almost  entirely.  In  the  Province  of  Viatka  the  landlords  had 
been  given  sixteen  times  the  influence  compared  with  that  of 
the  peasants  that  they  had  before.  For  the  most  part  the 
peasants  either  took  very  little  interest,  or  boycotted  the 
elections  entirely.  When  they  did  vote,  however,  they  voted 
for  Socialist  and  revolutionary  electors  just  as  before.  I  have 
already  shown  that  there  were  only  a  handful  of  reactionaries 


THE  PEASANTS  BECOME  SOCIALISTS  325 

among  sixteen  thousand  peasant  electors.  In  a  large  number 
of  the  towns  also  revolutionary  electors  preponderated.  If 
the  workingmen  had  been  given  an  equal  vote  and  had  combined 
with  the  revolutionary  element  of  the  middle  class,  two-thirds 
or  three-fourths  of  the  population  of  every  city  in  Russia 
would  have  voted  Socialist. 

Another  class  of  the  population  from  which  both  the 
Government  and  the  moderate  reformers  hoped  to  get  great 
support,  took  the  attitude  of  the  peasants.  Of  the  small 
landowners,  very  few  participated  in  the  elections.  In  the 
Moscow  district,  out  of  one  thousand  four  hundred  and  eighty 
electors  only  sixteen  appeared,  and  in  the  district  of  Odessa 
only  one  came  out  of  one  thousand  nine  hundred.  In  the 
country  at  large  so  few  of  this  class  of  votes  appeared  that  more 
than  one-half  of  the  elections  could  not  take  place  at  the 
appointed  time.  It  need  not  be  inferred  that  the  small  landlords 
are  very  revolutionary,  but  it  is  evident  that  they  do  not  now 
consider  the  Government's  promises  to  be  worth  even  a  few 
hours  away  from  business,  though  they  were  much  interested 
in  the  former  Dumas. 

The  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party,  which  next  to  the  Laboiu- 
Group  is  most  successful  among  the  peasantry,  boycotted  the 
elections  everywhere.  Their  manifesto  calling  for  the  boycott 
explains  the  attitude  of  a  very  large  number  of  the  Russian 
people.     It  runs  in  part  as  follows: 

As  the  third  Duma  will  inevitably  be  a  sort  of  organisation  of  the 
reactionary  pseudo-constitutional  and  anti-revolutionary  forces  in 
general;  as  the  participation  in  the  Duma  of  revolutionary  elements 
will  only  help  the  Government  to  give  the  next  Duma  an  appearance  of 
an  authoritative  parliament;  as  this  will  strengthen  the  financial  and 
international  position  of  the  Government;  as  under  such  conditions  to 
go  into  the  Dirnia  would  be  logical  only  for  those  who  have  lost  faith 
in  the  revolution  and  to  whom  therefore  the  non-participation  in  the 
Duma  is  equal  to  passivity  and  inactivity;  the  council  of  the  Socialist 
Revolutionary  Party  therefore  resolves  to  take  a  most  energetic  part  in 
the  election  campaign  agitation  for  the  propaganda  of  an  effective 
demonstrative  boycott  by  the  population  at  the  elections  as  well  as  in 
the  Duma  itself;  to  make  a  pressure  by  means  of  public  opinion  upon 
radical  deputies  in  the  Duma,  if  there  be  any  such,  with  the  purpose  of 
impelling  them  demonstratively  to  go  out  of  the  Duma  and  leave  it  to 
its  naturally  wretched  lot. 


326  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

In  accordance  with  this  poUcy  the  few  popular  representatives 
who  have  really  entered  the  Duma  have  lost  no  occasion  to 
tempt  the  reactionaries  to  expel  them.  Liachnitzky,  a  member 
of  the  Labour  Group,  told  the  Duma  that  'the  great  mass  of 
people  who  most  need  reform  are  not  represented  here"  — 
to  the  great  scandal  of  the  reactionaries,  who  scarcely  allowed 
his  voice  to  be  heard  through  the  tumult  they  created.  "As 
a  representative  of  the  population,"  said  another  member  of 
the  same  group,  Petrov,  "as  a  workingman,  I  repeat  what 
my  comrade  voters  have  told  me.  We  are  suffocating  under 
these  laws,  we  are  dying  under  these  laws.  The  voters  said 
to  us,  'demand  the  rights  for  the  pople  that  are  rotting  in 
the  prisons  and  mines;  your  duty  is  to  fight  for  freedom.'  " 

It  would  seem  that  even  this  relatively  moderate  revolutionary 
party,  the  Labour  Group,  is  entirely  of  the  opinion  of  the  more 
radical  Socialist  Revolutionary  leader,  the  late  Gregory  Gershuni, 
who,  though  his  own  party  had  boycotted  the  Duma  and  had 
no  representatives  there,  urged  the  Labour  Group  to"  demand 
frankly  the  execution  of  the  national  will,  full  political 
amnesty,  the  realisation  of  the  promised  liberties,  the  judgment 
of  the  autocratic  Government  by  the  people  and  the  convocation 
of  a  constitutional  assembly  elected  by  universal  suffrage. 
This  is  the  task,  says  the  well-known  revolutionist,  that  the 
Labour  Group  must  assume;  it  must  understand  that  its  end 
is  not  the  realisation  of  half-way  reforms,  for  it  will  never 
succeed  in  tearing  anything  from  the  Government,  but  the 
frank  and  clear  statement  of  the  popular  demands  in  order  that 
the  people  should  consider  the  Labour  Group  as  the  true 
representative  of  its  interest. 


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V^         OF  THE         f^ 

••'VERSITY 


A    TYPICAL   EDUCATED    LEADER    OF   THE    PEASANTRY 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  PEASANT  PARTIES  ABANDON  HOPE  IN  THE  DUMA 

AS  THE  people  have  grown  conscious  of  their  unity,  the 
revolutionary  movement  has  become  more  profound. 
At  the  opening  of  the  first  Duma  the  members  of  all  the  popular 
parties,  including  those  of  the  Social  Democratic  workingmen's 
party,  were  organised  together  in  the  "Labour  Group,"  all  were 
looking  forward  to  an  early  overthrow  of  the  Czarism,  and  all 
were  demanding  a  constitutional  assembly  elected  by  equal 
suffrage.  But  the  unity  was  based  on  political  grounds.  As 
the  land  question  came  into  the  foreground  and  the  revolutionary 
movement  became  a  social  movement,  the  unity  was  threatened, 
and  it  was  only  after  a  vast  discussion  and  much  disagreement 
on  the  fundamental  land  question  that  the  popular  parties  have 
again  all  reached  a  very  similar  standpoint.  As  long  as  the 
Duma  had  any  chance  of  becoming  an  organ  not  alone  of  a 
political  but  also  of  a  social  revolution,  the  parties  were  some- 
what disunited,  principally  on  account  of  the  essential  question 
as  to  whether  the  city  working  people  or  the  peasants  were  to 
be  the  principal  factor  in  the  movement;  but  after  the  Govern- 
ment had  destroyed  all  hopes  of  bringing  about  any  revolution 
through  the  Duma,  the  parties  again  began  to  come  together. 
There  remain  important  theoretical  differences,  but  practically 
on  the  land  question  and  on  the  agreement  that  the  revolution 
needs  for  its  success  outside  the  Duma  the  overwhelming 
majority  both  of  the  peasants  and  workingmen,  the  popular  i 
parties  are  again  united. 

The  organisation  which  has  done  the  most  to  bring  about 
this  unity  is  the  Labour  Group.  It  was  revolutionary  enough 
to  declare  at  the  dissolution  of  the  first  Duma  that  the  people 
must  be  the  absolute  masters  of  the  State,  and  that  all  the  land 
of  Russia  must  belong  to  the  entire  people ;  and  it  was  Socialist 
enough  to  demand  measures  leading  toward  a  permanent  equali- 

327 


328  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

sation  of  the  land  among  the  peasantry.  This  organisation 
was  able  to  please  more  or  less  all  the  other  Socialist  and 
revolutionary  parties,  and  became  at  the  same  time  immensely 
popular  among  the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  peasants, 
those  not  yet  organised.  The  party  wanted  the  Constitutional 
Democrats  to  insert  in  the  Viborg  manifesto  an  appeal  to  the 
people  no  longer  to  obey  the  Government  "in  fratricidal 
war  with  the  nation"  and  to  return  to  St.  Petersburg  and 
attempt  at  least  to  resume  the  session  of  the  Duma.  Meet- 
ing a  refusal  on  the  part  of  the  moderates,  it  turned  to  the 
people  with  a  proclamation  that  closed  by  calling  for  a 
Duma  of  the  people  with  full  sovereignty,  or  in  other 
words,  a  constitutional  assembly.  "The  Czar  with  his 
ministers,"  the  Labour  Group  declared,  "has  closed  for  us  all 
peaceful  roads  to  liberty  and  justice,  let  us  try  to  clear  them 
by  force." 

From  the  beginning  this  party  owed  most  of  its  ruling  ideas 
and  the  majority  of  its  most  active  leaders  and  organisers  to 
the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party ;  not  being  a  dogmatic  organi- 
sation, however,  it  has  laid  aside  all  the  theoretical  elements 
of  revolutionary  Socialism  and  retained  only  the  programme  of 
the  immediate  measures  proposed.  In  the  first  Duma  half  of 
the  group  consisted  of  the  peasants  who  had  not  yet  made  up 
their  minds  on  the  leading  issues;  of  the  others  a  part  were 
connected  with  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  and  Peasants' 
Union, or  held  independent  Socialist  views;  another  part  leaned 
to  the  Socialist  Democratic  Party  or  were  members  of  that 
organisation,  but  these  soon  left  the  group  and  the  Socialist 
Revolutionary  influence  became  dominant.  In  the  first  Duma 
one-third,  and  in  the  second  Duma  one-half,  of  the  members  of 
the  group  signed  the  land  bill  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary 
Party.  In  the  second  Duma  the  majority  of  the  party  became 
more  revolutionary  in  a  political  sense,  and  made  use  of  their 
position  in  the  Duma  solely  to  stir  up  an  agitation  among  the 
people  of  the  country,  abandoning  all  hope  of  turning  the  Duma 
itself  into  a  revolutionary  body ;  both  of  these  actions  helped  to 
secure  a  tremendous  popularity  for  the  organisation  among  the 
peasantry.  The  party,  which  in  the  first  Duma  had  forced  the 
moderates  and  the  whole  Duma  to  a  revolutionary  position, 


PEASANTS  ABANDON  HOPE  329 

used  the  second  Duma  to  unite  the  masses  of  the  people  on  a 
revolutionary  and  Socialist  programme. 

The  keynote  to  the  Socialist  land  reform  of  this  organisation 
is  a  proposal  to  equalise  permanently  the  distribution  of  the 
land,  just  as  the  foimders  of  the  American  Republic  had 
temporarily  equalised  the  Government  lands  in  the  new  part 
of  the  country.  As  there  is  not  enough  land  in  Russia  to  enable 
the  Government  to  provide  for  all,  measures  must  be  taken  to 
prevent  its  accimiulation  in  the  future  in  the  hands  of  a  few 
persons,  a  process  which  takes  place  very  rapidly  wherever 
the  population  is  crowded  as  in  Russia.  The  group  realises 
that  pure  political  democracy,  far  more  advanced  than  the 
constitution  of  the  United  States,  is  necessary  in  order  to  put 
into  execution  such  a  revolutionary  measure,  and  it  is  therefore 
for  political  revolution ;  but  it  also  feels  that  only  with  an  equal 
distribution  of  the  land  would  the  democracy  be  truly  strong, 
and  so  it  insists  also  on  the  principle  of  a  permanent  economic 
equality  in  the  distribution  of  the  land.  It  has  long  been 
recognised  by  democratic  writers  of  all  countries  that  political 
liberty  itself  depends  on  some  approach  at  least  to  economic 
equality.  From  Rousseau  to  de  Tocqueville  in  his  comments 
on  America,  we  have  been  told  that  political  equality  cannot 
continue  to  exist  where  there  is  an  imequal  distribution  of 
wealth. 

The  Russians  are  hopeful  for  a  social  solution  of  the  land 
question,  because  the  large  majority  of  the  peasants  are  not 
only  its  converted  but  its  bom  partisans,  having  maintained  a 
certain  economic  equality  in  the  villages  for  generations  through 
their  common  ownership  of  the  land.  Whatever  be  the 
solution  of  the  land  question,  whether  the  commtmal  ownership 
continues  or  not,  Russians  are  convinced  that  its  principles 
are  a  part  of  the  peasant's  very  soul  and  that  the  peasants  will 
demand  not  only  political,  but  also  economic,  equality  as  a 
permanent  principle  of  Russian  society. 

"We  wish  to  have  the  land  to  work  it,"  said  Anikine  in  the 
first  Duma.  "We  do  not  want  it  as  private  property — no, 
and  again  no!  No  private  property;  such  notions  do  not  exist 
in  the  juridical  conscience  of  the  Russian  peasants.  It  has  been 
claimed  here  that  the  peasants  want  private  property  in  land  in 


330  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

order  to  be  able  to  will  it  to  their  children,  but  look  at  the 
transfers  of  the  land  in  the  various  sections  of  the  country  and 
you  will  see  that  this  is  not  the  case  and  that  the  peasants  have 
rather  a  horror  of  this  private  property."  Anikine  then  cited  at 
length  many  documents  proving  that  even  in  the  western 
provinces,  where  the  communal  form  of  property  does  not 
prevail,  the  peasants  in  their  village  regulations  of  inheritance 
have  ideas  against  private  inheritance  and  are  in  favour  of  the 
distribution  of  the  land  of  deceased  peasants  on  principles  of 
social  justice. 

It  is  only  in  the  non-Russian  parts  of  the  country,  Poland 
and  the  Baltic  provinces  and  Lithuania,  and  in  relatively  small 
sections  of  White  and  Little  Russia  and  the  three  Border 
provinces,  that  private  property  is  the  dominant  form  among 
the  peasantry.  Even  in  the  western  provinces,  Little  and 
White  Russia,  from  a  quarter  to  a  third  of  the  peasants  live 
under  the  communal  system.  In  the  other  parts  of  the  country, 
two-thirds  of  the  whole,  commion  ownership  by  village  prevails 
in  from  80  to  95  per  cent,  of  the  peasant  households.  In  the 
centre  the  proportion  rises  to  90  per  cent.,  in  the  north  and 
east  to  more  than  95.  Of  the  fifteen  million  peasant  house- 
holds in  Russia  proper,  only  four  hundred  thousand  have 
private  property  in  land.  The  Government  is  using  every 
effort  to  increase  this  number,  and  it  may  soon  rise  to  a  million 
or  perhaps  even  to  a  million  and  a  half;  even  then  in  the  villages 
only  half  a  dozen  families  out  of  one  hundred  or  two  hundred 
will  have  private  property. 

Communal  property  has  even  been  growing  in  popularity. 
In  some  of  the  eastern  provinces  the  redistributions  of  the  land 
by  which  equality  is  maintained  have  doubled  in  frequency 
since  the  emancipation,  until  now  in  two-thirds  of  the  villages 
redistribution  takes  place  within  each  decade.  In  thirty-seven 
provinces  statistics  show  that  one-half  of  the  villagers  are 
redistributing  the  village  property  according  to  the  needs  of 
each  household  —  that  is,  according  to  the  mouths  to  be  fed  — 
while  in  the  most  typical  agricultural  section  of  Central  Russia 
the  proportion  rises  to  two-thirds.  The  village  property  is 
also  often  redistributed  to  each  family  in  proportion  to  the 
amount  of  workers  in  the  family,  or  its  "labour  power."     The 


<  ^ 


BIELEVSKY 
Under  "house  arrest"  in  Moscow  at  time  of  my  interview 


PEASANTS  ABANDON  HOPE  331 

majority  of  the  peasants  of  Russia,  then,  have  no  underlying 
instinct  for  private  property,  but  quite  the  contrary;  the  habit 
is  rather  one  of  cooperation,  seen  not  only  in  many  undertakings 
by  the  democratic  government  of  the  village,  but  also  in  the 
associations  for  cooperative  labour,  or  "artels,"  that  are  so 
common  among  the  peasantry.  There  is  no  mystic  idea  among 
them  of  some  legal  bond  existing  between  a  man  and  a  thing 
which  he  has  not  produced.  The  land  is  felt  by  them  to  be  a 
thing  apart,  very  precious  and  insufficient  in  quantity,  and  so 
obviously  to  be  divided  according  to  democratic  and  social 
principles. 

Conservative  authority  is  not  lacking  to  support  this 
interpretation  of  the  Russian  peasants'  attitude  in  regard  to 
land.  Coimt  Witte  declared  a  few  years  ago  that,  in  spite  of 
all  the  Government's  efforts,  it  was  unable  to  innure  peasants 
to  private  property,  and  Milyoukov  has  declared  to  the  Duma 
that  the  small  individual  property  ideal  is  no  Russian  ideal. 

Mushenko,  a  member  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party, 
said  that  the  principal  defence  of  private  property  in  land  was 
that  it  assured  durability  in  the  possession  of  the  land  for 
the  persons  working  on  it.  He  then  denied  that  this  was  the 
fact  in  most  countries  and  quoted  a  Russian  Government  report 
on  the  question  as  follows: 

The  study  of  other  countries  has  proved  to  us  beyond  doubt  that 
small  peasant  households,  when  submitted  to  the  same  free  conditions 
of  purchase  and  sale  as  other  property,  are  not  durable  and  gradually 
vanish  away,  giving  place  to  land  ownership  of  a  different  character: 
on  the  one  side,  a  concentration  of  a  great  number  of  separate  lots  under 
the  ownership  of  a  single  person  takes  place,  larger  households  are  formed 
and  a  large  part  of  the  agricultural  population  is  misplaced ;  on  the  other 
side,  there  arises  an  extreme  sub-division  of  the  land  (by  inheritance), 
some  lots  becoming  so  small  that  it  is  impossible  to  till  them  economi- 
cally, the  land  loses  its  productivity  and  finally  falls  into  the  hands 
of  larger  landowners. 

It  is  indeed  precisely  to  this  process,  as  we  have  seen,  that 
both  the  Government  and  leading  party  in  the  third  Duma 
are  looking  calmly  forward.  A  few  hundred  thousand  peasants, 
or  perhaps  a  million  or  more,  are  to  become  relatively  prosperous, 
while  many  millions  are  to  be  expropriated  by  natural  economic 
laws,  thus  furnishing  an  enormous  army  of  cheap  labour  for 


332  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  landlords  and  capitalists.  The  Government  itself  recognises 
that  the  process  might  go  so  far  as  to  become  dangerous, 
creating  desperate  village  disturbances,  and  proposes  the 
limitation  of  the  expected  concentration  of  property  in  the 
hands  of  a  few  peasants  to  the  shares  that  would  naturally  fall 
to  six  average  families  —  viz.,  twenty-five  dessatines  or  about 
sixty-five  acres. 

The  Government  proposes  to  favour  a  few  at  the  expense 
of  the  many  by  two  measures.  The  first  is  by  abolishing  all  the 
communal  property,  or  rather,  since  such  a  measure  cannot  be 
executed  against  the  will  of  the  peasantry,  of  allowing  individual 
peasants  to  demand  some  particular  piece  of  land,  equal  in 
value  to  their  present  share,  as  their  permanent  private 
property.  This  may  seem  to  one  unfamiliar  with  the  commune 
to  be  no  more  than  just  to  the  individual,  whether  a  wise  measure 
socially  or  not,  but  this  is  not  the  case.  Many  villages  have 
even  persuaded  all  the  peasants  to  swear  allegiance  to  the 
communal  form  of  ownership,  and  not  to  take  advantage  of  the 
law.  In  the  discussions  that  are  going  on  about  this  question 
among  the  peasants  all  over  Russia,  the  sentiment  is  over- 
whelming against  the  dissolution  of  the  commune,  as  was 
evidenced  by  nearly  all  the  Duma  members  representing  the 
peasants.  It  is  against  their  deepest  feelings  of  morality  and 
justice  that  a  man  with  few  or  no  dependents  should  be  allowed 
to  take  away  from  his  fellow  villagers  a  share  of  the  land 
attributed  to  him  years  before,  when  his  family  was  larger, 
while  some  peasant  households  with  ten  to  twenty  members 
are  without  sufficient  land  for  the  barest  livelihood.  So  strongly 
do  they  feel  this  injustice  to  them  as  individuals  that  they  are 
taking  every  measure  to  coerce  unsocial  members  of  the 
community  who  are  disposed  to  take  advantage  of  the  law. 
Although  in  force  for  many  months,  the  number  of  persons 
making  use  of  the  law  has  been  very  disappointing  to  the 
Government,  and  arbitrary  police  measures  have  failed  to 
increase  it. 

The  second  measure  promises  to  have  more  success  froiji  the 
Government  standpoint.  By  helping  financially  the  Peasants' 
Bank,  the  Government  has  enabled  it  to  buy  up  and  divide 
many  large  estates  and  sell  them  to  individual  peasants.     It  is 


PEASANTS  ABANDON  HOPE  333 

true  that  the  prices  asked  are  exorbitant  and  that  the  land  is 
often  overburdened  with  payments  to  the  bank  —  that  is, 
to  the  Government  —  greater  even  than  its  full  value ;  but 
nevertheless  a  great  deal  is  in  this  way  passing  over  into  the 
peasants'  hands,  in  the  one  year  1907  more  than  in  any  ten 
years  before,  nearly  twenty  million  acres.  Through  this  second 
law  the  Government  is  accomplishing  the  same  purpose  of 
favouring  the  creation  of  a  new  class  of  small  landowners  at 
the  expense  of  the  masses.  Its  reasons  are  obvious.  It  is  not 
alone  that  these  measures  favour  the  capitalists  and  landlords, 
who  want  to  exploit  the  new  army  of  pauper  labour  which  will 
arise,  though  this  motive  is  doubtless  the  main  influence  with 
the  majority  of  the  third  Duma.  Stolypine,  with  Witte,  has 
probably  still  more  at  heart  the  direct  interests  of  the  Czar's 
treasury.  The  State  income,  as  I  have  shown,  depends  largely 
on  the  building  up  of  industry,  and  industry  has  its  principal 
market  among  this  small  landowning  class,  since  the  peasants, 
as  has  been  explained,  barely  produce  enough  to  eat  and  there- 
fore can  purchase  little.  It  is  chiefly  from  this  class  that  the 
Government  can  hope  to  obtain  greater  sums,  either  by  direct 
taxation  or  by  indirect  taxation  of  the  tea,  sugar,  and  other 
articles  they  buy  in  quantities  the  ordinary  peasant  cannot 
afford.  As  Witte  has  explained  very  clearly,  the  peasants  are 
so  poor  that  it  does  not  pay  the  Government  to  help  them. 
There  is  no  promise  that  the  great  mass  of  them  will  have 
enough  money  in  the  near  future  either  to  promote  Russian 
industry  by  their  purchases,  or  to  be  able  in  any  way  to  help 
out  the  Russian  treasury,  so  near  to  bankruptcy. 

Indeed,  from  an  economic  standpoint,  half-way  measures 
of  relief  to  the  masses  of  the  peasants  would  lead  to  further 
impoverishment  of  the  nation  as  a  whole,  for  the  reason  that  the 
largest  of  the  estates  of  the  landlords  are  much  more  produc- 
tively operated  than  the  small  holdings;  the  decrease  of  the 
former  and  the  increase  of  the  latter,  while  benefiting  the 
peasants,  would  impoverish  the  nation  as  a  whole,  and  the 
Government  treasury  would  feel  the  result.  Statistics  from 
the  province  of  Poltava  show  that  the  large  properties  produce 
25  per  cent,  more  wheat  and  40  per  cent,  more  rye  than 
the  small.     Indeed,  there  is  already  raging  a  hopeless  economic 


334  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

conflict  between  the  two  cultures  —  the  landlords'  and  the 
peasants'.  The  famishing  peasants  having  so  little  land 
themselves  are  pressed  to  rent  that  of  the  landlords,  but  they 
cannot  produce  as  large  crops  and  often  do  not  get  enough 
even  to  pay  the  rent,  to  say  nothing  of  making  anything  to 
repay  their  labour.  For  example,  a  certain  Poltava  landlord 
calculated  that  he  could  get  nineteen  rubles  a  dessatine  by 
renting  his  land  at  an  exorbitant  figure,  whereas  he  made 
twenty-seven  by  cultivating  it  himself.  It  is  evident  then  that 
half-way  measures  under  these  conditions  might  really  imperil 
the  State  finances,  even  under  a  modem  and  democratic 
government ;  and  it  is  just  because  they  feel  this  that  the  peasant 
parties  want  to  find  a  far  more  fundamental  solution. 

Nearly  every  measure  proposed  by  the  Government  is  a  half- 
way, and  therefore  a  retrograde,  measure.  It  is  doing  everything 
possible,  for  instance,  to  encourage  emigration  to  Siberia, 
and  in  the  last  year  for  the  first  time  has  had  considerable 
success.  However,  even  if  half  a  million  peasants  are  removed 
to  the  new  country  every  year,  the  Government  will  not  in  this 
way  be  able  to  provide  even  for  a  third  of  the  annual  increase 
of  population.  The  Siberian  peasants  would  seem  to  be 
relatively  prosperous,  exporting  as  they  do  large  amounts  of 
butter  and  eggs,  but  we  find  on  investigation  that  no  section  of 
the  Russian  peasantry  is  more  revolutionary,  and  we  see  the 
explanation  of  this  attitude  partly  in  the  heavy  railway  rates  on 
which  these  isolated  farmers  are  absolutely  dependent.  Like 
the  new  small  landowning  class  the  Government  is  creating  in 
Russia  itself,  they  are  burdened  with  immense  taxation  either 
on  their  purchases  of  goods  or  in  payment  for  the  land;  even 
the  amount  advanced  by  the  Government  to  get  them  to 
Siberia  is  a  serious  matter  for  the  pauperised  peasants.  This 
taxation  is  not  likely  to  be  diminished.  The  Government,  on 
the  verge  of  bankruptcy,  is  using  every  possible  means  of 
extorting  money;  it  will  hardly  exempt  these  new  classes  that 
have  no  representation  either  in  the  Duma  or  the  Government. 

The  discontent  on  account  of  the  heavy  taxation  is  not  the 
only  additional  danger  the  Government  has  to  fear  from  this 
new  class.  The  first  famine  that  appears,  a  large  proportion  of 
the  new  debtors  of  the  Governmental  Peasants'  Bank  will  prove 


PEASANTS  ABANDON  HOPE  335 

delinquent  and  will  turn  all  the  wrath  formerly  spent  on  the 
landlords  against  the  Government.  All  the  revolutionary 
representatives  of  the  peasants  in  the  Duma  are  looking  forward 
to  this  new  class,  which  the  Government  is  trying  to  create, 
as  a  powerful  factor  in  the  coming  revolutionary  movement. 

In  a  private  conversation  I  had  with  Anikine  in  the  summer 
of  1907,  the  most  popular  of  all  the  peasant  leaders  set  his  main 
hope  of  the  revolutionising  of  the  peasantry  on  the  high  pay- 
ments which  would  be  demanded  from  them  by  the  Government 
for  the  new  land.  He  thought  that  these  reforms  would  bring 
about  a  new  revolutionary  movement  quicker  than  any  other 
measures  the  Government  could  take.  "In  trying  to  satisfy 
the  peasants*  land  hunger,"  he  said,  "the  Government  is  digging 
its  own  grave."  The  same  view  is  held  by  the  Socialist  Revolu- 
tionary Party ;  it  expects  that  the  peasants  will  be  both  unable 
and  unwilling  to  pay  for  the  land  they  are  now  buying,  and 
basing  its  hopes  largely  on  this  measure  it  is  preparing  to  renew 
its  agitation  in  the  villages  in  the  most  thoroughgoing  way. 

The  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  expects  to  win  to  the 
Socialist  ideas  not  only  such  peasants  as  have  become  landless, 
and  therefore  uninterested  in  the  preservation  of  private  prop- 
erty in  land,  but  also  the  communal  peasants  who  have  already 
learned  to  believe  in  the  equal  distribution.  It  does  not  wish 
to  see  Russia  proceed  further  "along  the  sad  and  beaten  path 
of  capitalistic  development,"  and  to  prevent  this  it  hopes  to 
preserve  the  village  commune  against  all  Governmental  attacks. 
The  Socialist  Revolutionist  expect  to  make  use  both  of  the 
vague  yearnings  for  social  liberty  and  equality  that  have  grown 
up  in  the  democratic  village  assembly  and  of  the  very  clear 
social  conceptions  with  regard  to  land,  labour,  and  human 
relations  that  have  resulted  from  the  long  prevalence  of  com- 
munal property.  These  yearnings  and  these  definite  concep- 
tions they  hope  to  combine  into  an  intelligent  political 
programme. 

For  the  purpose  of  arousing  the  peasants  they  hope  first 
of  all  to  make  popular  among  them  the  agrarian  bill  signed  by 
the  majority  of  the  peasant  deputies  of  the  second  Duma.  They 
expect  to  adapt  this  bill  to  local  conditions  and  thus  to  make  its 
application   clear   to   the   villages.     They   appeal   also   to   the 


336  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

peasantry  to  take  advantage  of  their  right  of  communal  property, 
to  redistribute  the  land  not  after  the  end  of  ten  years  or  more, 
as  is  the  usual  custom,  but  immediately.  In  this  way  they  hope 
to  satisfy  all  elements  in  the  community  and  to  eliminate  the 
chief  motive  that  tempts  the  individual  to  sell  out  —  namely, 
dissatisfaction  with  his  present  allotment.  They  expect  to 
take  advantage  of  the  peasants'  cooperative  traditions  to  form 
new  organisations,  especially  for  the  lowering  of  rents  and  the 
raising  of  wages.  In  general  they  are  using  every  effort  to 
strengthen  and  further  organise  the  village  as  a  vmit  and  to 
promote  its  interests  both  against  the  anti-social  individual 
and  the  anti-social  State. 

In  most  of  the  practical  features  of  its  programme  the  Socia- 
list Revolutionary  Party  has  the  support  of  several  other  very 
important  organisations,  including  the  Teachers'  Union,  the 
Railway  Union  and,  best  of  all,  the  Peasants'  Union.  The 
policy  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  is  to  promote  in 
every  way  these  and  similar  organisations,  while  preserving  its 
own  political  independence.  Besides  meeting  the  majority 
of  the  chief  leaders  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party,  I  have 
taken  pains  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  nearly  all  the  founders 
of  the  Peasants'  Union  and  of  several  of  the  active  officers  of 
the  Teachers'  and  Railway  Unions.  I  have  visited  these  organi- 
sations in  their  headquarters  and  attended  one  of  the  congresses. 
The  policy  of  these  organisations  has  been  to  aid  only  in  a  general 
way  the  revolutionary  movement,  without  adopting  a  too 
definite  programme  which  might  offend  any  particular  revolu- 
tionary political  party.  The  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party 
gives  full  recognition  to  the  Peasants'  Union  as  being  the  im- 
portant economical  organisation  of  the  peasant  classes.  At 
no  time  have  there  been  fundamental  matters  of  difference 
between  these  two  organisations.  They  have  always  had 
many  important  members  in  common,  while  the  party  has 
furnished  a  large  portion  of  the  persons  who  have  done  most  to 
spread  the  union  among  the  villages. 

I  have  written  at  some  length  of  the  Labour  Group.  I  must 
call  attention  now  to  the  fact  that  it  took  nearly  all  its' pro- 
gramme, as  well  as  its  tactics,  from  the  Peasants*  Union,  and 
that  many  of  the  founders  both  of  the  union  and  the  Labour 


PEASANTS  ABANDON  HOPE  337 

Group  were  former  members  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary 
Party.  The  principal  element  of  the  Labour  Group's  solution 
of  the  land  question,  that  each  peasant  is  to  have  only  so  much 
land  as  he  can  work  with  his  own  labour,  was  taken  directly 
from  the  Peasants'  Union.  But  the  latter  organisation  has 
always  been  somewhat  more  revolutionary.  The  Labour 
Group  was  under  the  necessity  of  assimiliating  and  educating 
many  peasants  who,  though  all  broadly  speaking  revolutionary 
and  in  favour  of  expropriating  the  landlords'  estates,  had  no 
other  very  definite  political  ideas. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  LEADERS  OF  THE  PEOPLE 

THE  founders  of  the  Peasants'  Union  were  all  merely  seeking 
to  express  the  existing  state  of  opinion  of  the  peasantry. 
The  union  was  really  founded  by  the  peasants  themselves.  The 
resolutions  of  its  first  congress  in  Moscow  in  July,  1905,  were 
printed  in  all  the  Russian  press,  and,  through  the  teachers  or 
progressive  and  educated  peasants,  soon  reached  a  large  part 
of  the  villages.  It  is  not  surprising  that  it  was  everywhere 
received  with  favour,  for  the  first  congress  was  composed  largely 
of  ordinary  peasants.  To  understand  how  the  idea  of  the 
union  was  received,  and  branches  formed  without  any  local 
agitation,  let  us  take  an  account  of  a  meeting  that  was  held  in 
Saratov  in  the  summer  of  1905.  This  and  other  meetings  in 
that  province  were  reported  to  the  Central  Committe  by  the 
writer  Bogoraz,  and  had  a  good  deal  to  do  with  shaping  the 
future  policy  of  the  union,  of  which  Bogoraz  became  a 
secretary.  After  a  long  discussion  by  the  peasants,  who  had 
assembled  to  discuss  not  the  Peasants'  Union  but  the  question 
of  cooperation,  they  decided  that  there  was  no  use  in  orga- 
nising a  cooperative  society  under  the  insufferable  conditions 
that  prevailed,  and  drew  up  after  several  hours'  labo\ir  the 
following  resolution: 

We  are  born  and  brought  up  in  the  villages.  We  do  not  know  any 
other  occupation  except  agriculture.  We  are  not  in  a  condition  to  occupy 
ourselves  with  other  things  because  we  are  lacking  the  means  for  it- 
Agriculture  has  to  nourish  us;  it  has  to  give  us  the  possibility  of  saving 
a  few  pennies  for  our  dark  days,  for  the  famine  years,  or  in  case  we  have 
to  marry  off  a  daughter  or  send  our  sons  into  military  service.  This 
occupation  has  to  give  us  means  of  pa5ang  taxes,  of  paying  for  our  elected 
authorities,  our  clergy,  our  school,  our  hospitals,  and  -of  constructing 
our  roads  and  paying  the  indirect  taxes,  which  are  the  most  important 
of  all  and  fall  entirely  on  us.  All  the  taxes  on  alcohol,  petroleum,  tea, 
sugar   and   matches   come   principally   from   us.     We   have   to   extract 

338 


THE   LEADERS  OF  THE  PEOPLE  339 

hundreds  of  millions  of  rubles  from  our  land  to  pay  for  the  needs  of  the 
State,  and  in  spite  of  this  the  land  that  we  possess  gives  us  a  chance  to 
live  only  in  a  half-starved  condition. 

That  is  what  we  are  suffering  from,  the  lack  of  land;  but  the  lack  of 
liberty  makes  us  suffer  still  more.  We  have  such  a  quantity  of  officials 
over  us  that  at  times  we  do  not  know  whom  we  ought  to  fear  most.  We 
do  not  know  why  they  exist  in  such  a  number,  or  who  has  installed  them, 
but  we  know  that  those  who  are  most  numerous  here  are  like  guards  over 
prisons.  One  might  think  that  we  peasants  are  the  greatest  of  criminals. 
All  our  officials  shout  at  us,  curse  us,  threaten  us  with  prison,  the  whip 
and  "nagaika, "  and  with  forced  military  service.  They  have  only  one 
law,  the  club.  They  know  only  one  kind  word  to  address  us  with; 
it  is  "give." 

The  "land  officials,"  the  police  captain,  the  police  colonel  and  the 
governor,  even  the  elected  authorities  of  the  village,  even  the  priests  who 
ought  to  be  our  fathers  in  Christ,  they  too  do  nothing  but  laugh  at  us. 
Our  assembly  has  no  power  over  them.  All  the  power  is  in  the  hands  of 
the  officials  and  the  upper  classes.  We  build  schools  to  have  our  chil- 
dren taught.  We  want  our  children  to  learn  the  truth  in  these  schools, 
but  the  officials  send  us  teachers  not  of  our  choice.  These  teachers 
teach  our  children  all  sorts  of  stupidity  in  the  place  of  true  knowledge. 
They  forbid  our  children  to  read  good  books.  They  hide  the  truth  from 
them.  We  do  not  know  where  the  taxes  go  that  are  collected  from  us, 
but  we  know  that  if  we  do  not  pay  them  in  time  acts  of  violence  are 
committed  against  us. 

We  have  no  true  justice.  We  have  no  defence,  if  injustice  is  committed 
against  us.  When  we  want  to  defend  ourselves  soldiers  are  sent  and 
beat  us.  It  is  our  brothers  and  sons  that  do  the  beating,  our  brothers 
and  our  children  whom  we  tear  from  our  families  and  send  to  defend  the 
Fatherland.  They  teach  them  instead  to  kill  their  own  brothers,  but  they 
do  not  learn  how  to  defend  the  Fatherland. 

This  cannot  last.  We  must  confess  that  we  find  it  necessary  to  bring 
it  about  that  this  state  of  things  be  changed. 

People  elected  by  everybody  ought  to  govern  the  country,  and  not 
only  the  officials.  All  the  voters  ought  to  be  equal,  the  rich  and  the  poor, 
the  educated  and  the  uneducated.  Those  elected  by  the  people  must 
give  equal  laws  for  all  and  they  must  follow  the  way  in  which  the  people's 
money  is  being  expended. 

The  army  must  be  replaced  by  a  popular  militia,  so  that  every  man 
should  learn  military  science  at  home  and  during  his  free  time.  We  are 
sure  that  such  a  militia  in  the  case  of  war  will  know  how  to  defend  our 
country  as  well  as  the  present  army. 

The  people  must  have  the  liberty  of  meeting  and  of  speaking  freely 
about  everything,  about  affairs  of  state  and  about  social  questions. 
The  censorship  must  be  abolished. 

All  crimes  must  be  judged  by  jury,  and  the  right  should  not  exist  to 
arrest  any  one  more  than  two  days  without  judgment. 


340  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Taxes  ought  not  to  be  collected  as  now  by  the  taxation  of  poor  p)eople 
alone.  A  certain  per  cent,  of  income  ought  to  be  taken  and  this  per  cent, 
ought  to  be  increased  according  to  the  size  of  the  property  owned;  a 
large  part  of  an  inheritance  that  one  has  received  ought  also  to  be  taxed, 
for  this  is  not  money  earned. 

Complete  liberty  of  conscience  ought  to  exist.  The  clergy  must  be 
elected  by  the  people.  Education  of  the  people  must  be  free  and  equal 
for  all,  and  the  Government  must  give  the  money  for  it. 

Finally,  and  this  is  the  most  important,  this  will  put  an  end  to  our 
servitude  and  stop  our  ruin  —  for  servitude  still  exists,  and  alongside 
the  peasant  agriculturists  are  living  landlords  who  are  enriching  them- 
selves by  the  peasants'  labour,  which  they  can  do  because  of  their  right 
of  possessing  God's  property  —  finally,  it  is  indispensable  to  expropriate 
all  private  lands  and  to  give  these  lands  into  the  possession  of  the  villages 
which  will  give  it  only  to  him  who  cultivates  it  with  his  own  labour. 
Only  when  all  that  will  be  accomplished  will  the  people  be  able  to  live 
and  commence  a  regular  life,  but  if  all  that  is  not  accomplished  a  great 
misfortune  awaits  our  country. 

To  realise  all  these  demands  we  find  necessary  the  immediate  convo- 
cation of  a  constitutional  assembly  on  the  principle  of  universal,  equal, 
and  secret  suffrage. 

For  the  struggle  to  obtain  these  reforms  we  are  founding  the  Peasants' 
Union  of  the  district  of  Petrovsk.  The  founders  of  this  union  are  all 
the  members  present  at  this  conference. 

The  last  words  give  us  a  key  to  the  origin  of  the  union. 
Everywhere  the  peasants  themselves  took  the  initiative  as  soon 
as  they  heard  that  such  an  organisation  was  being  formed.  All 
those  who  did  the  work  of  organising  report  that  villages  sent 
to  request  them  to  put  these  villages  into  relations  with  the 
national  organisation.     Locally  no  agitation  was  necessary. 

A  few  words  about  the  educated  organisers  of  the  union  in 
Moscow  and  St.  Petersburg  might  not,  however,  be  inappro- 
priate. In  the  country  the  organisation  was  promoted  chiefly 
by  the  employees  of  the  local  governments,  teachers,  doctors, 
agricultural  experts  and  others,  all  of  whom  had  their  national 
organisations  which  aided  in  the  movement.  Besides  these 
organisations  there  was  a  little  group  of  men  in  Moscow  among 
whom  the  idea  at  first  took  root,  largely  as  a  reaction  against 
the  effort  of  the  Government  to  organise  the  peasants  into^some 
form  of  "patriotic"  association.  The  "patriotic"  association 
was  a  failure,  but  the  Peasants'  Union  was  perhaps  the  most 
remarkable  and  quickly  successful  effort  to  bring  into  imity 


THE  LEADERS  OF  THE  PEOPLE  341 

a  disassociated  mass  of  many  million  people,  of  which  we  have 
any  record. 

Perhaps  the  first  initiator  of  the  idea  was  a  lawyer  named 
Staal,  who  had  obtained  his  first  ideas  of  social  movements 
while  a  student  in  Germany.  He  saw  then,  he  told  me,  that 
the  organisation  of  the  masses  after  the  manner  of  the  Social 
Democratic  Party  in  Germany  would  never  succeed  in  Russia, 
principally  because  only  a  very  small  proportion  of  the  Russian 
people  are  working  people  while  a  vast  majority  are  peasants. 
Yet  he  felt  that  the  future  social  transformation  must  come 
through  some  form  of  popular  organisation. 

After  the  massacre  of  January  22,  1905,  the  Czar  granted 
certain  limited  rights  to  meet  to  discuss  "the  needs  and  the 
benefits  of  the  Government."  Taking  advantage  of  this  law, 
Staal  conceived  the  idea  of  starting  some  kind  of  Peasants* 
Union  in  opposition  to  the  association  that  the  reactionaries 
were  trying  to  establish.  Bringing  together  several  friends 
and  acquaintances  in  Moscow,  principally  active  members  of 
the  national  organisations  of  agricultural  experts  and  statisti- 
cians, who  had  been  in  close  contact  with  the  peasantry,  Staal 
proposed  the  idea  of  his  association.  Most  valuable  among  his 
friends  was  a  peasant  Kurneen,  still  in  touch  with  his  village, 
but  a  man  of  affairs  and  agent  for  the  Rothschild  oil  business 
in  Moscow.  The  small  committee  wrote  a  proclamation  with 
Kurneen  *s  assistance  and  sent  it  out  among  the  villages  of  the 
Moscow  province  through  Kumeen's  agents  and  the  salesmen 
of  tea  and  caldrons.  The  proclamation  was  at  once  well 
received  in  all  the  villages  and  the  agents  soon  brought  back 
suggestions  from  the  peasants  about  the  future  organisation 
of  the  union.  At  the  same  time  Masurenko,  a  former  army 
officer,  was  carrying  on  similar  work  independently  in  the  Don 
district.     It  was  soon  decided  to  call  a  congress. 

With  the  aid  especially  of  the  teachers'  organisation,  and  of 
Masurenko,  a  very  large  number  of  the  villages,  representing 
perhaps  a  million  peasants,  sent  delegates  to  the  first  congress. 
From  the  outset  the  members  of  the  union  and  the  dele^ 
gates  to  the  congress  took  a  radical  position  on  economic  ques- 
tions, demanding  the  expropriation  of  all  the  landlords*  land, 
its  division  among  only  those  who  work  the  land  themselves, 


342  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  abolition  of  indirect  taxation,  and  the  establishment  of  a 
progressive  income  tax. 

It  was  evident  that  the  union  was  no  artificial  organisation 
but  had  grown  up  from  the  people  themselves.  The  majority  of 
the  founders  of  the  union  were  what  may  be  called  independent 
Socialists ;  most  of  them  were  inspired  with  the  Socialist  Revolu- 
tionary programme,  but  they  did  not  feel  that  it  would  be 
just  or  practical  to  urge  their  ideas  on  the  peasant  delegates 
and  left  them  entirely  free  to  work  out  their  own  programme 
with  a  few  stimulating  suggestions.  They  were  democratic 
leaders,  that  is,  they  were  helping  the  people  to  go  where  they 
themselves  desired.  I  talked  with  nearly  all  of  them.  One  of 
the  most  interesting  of  these  conversations  was  with  the  well- 
known  writer  on  agriculture  and  economics,  Bielevski,  while  he 
was  under  house  arrest  with  the  gendarmes  before  his  door.  It 
was  just  about  one  year  after  the  first  congress  of  the  union. 
Bielevski  was  looking  forward  to  a  long  and  frightful  revolution. 
He  said  that  a  foreigner  only  imagined  he  observed  Russia's 
condition,  for  he  could  not  see  how  Russian  hearts  were  full 
of  hate.  He  spoke  of  the  Czar's  punishment  expeditions,  of 
his  armies  of  revenge,  and  said  that  the  people  were  almost 
insane  with  anger. 

"The  Government,"  he  said,  "is  used  to  using  the  'nagaika' 
and  blows;  it  hates  the  people,  while  the  people  hate  the  Govern- 
ment, as  a  slave  does  his  master."  He  believed  that  the  Govern- 
ment had  gone  so  far  in  betraying  its  promises  that  it  had 
compromised  among  the  people  not  only  itself  but  the  Czar 
also.  He  tried  to  picture  the  state  of  mind  of  the  peasants  by 
calling  attention  to  the  thousands  and  thousands  of  flayed 
backs  all  over  the  country.  These  were  things  that  were  never 
forgotten.  He  thought  that  the  people  had  learned  more  during 
the  year  since  the  union  had  been  founded  than  they  had  in  a 
generation.  He  insisted  not  only  that  the  revolutionary 
sentiment  but  also  the  Socialist  programme  of  the  union  came 
from  the  peasants  themselves,  since  they  knew  that  if  free  trade 
in  land  was  allowed  in  starving  Russia  they  would  be  forced 
to  sell  their  little  lots  at  the  very  first  famine. 

Staal  and  Kumeen  also  insisted  that  the  union  had  only  put 
in  words  what  the  peasants  were  already  thinking.     The  union 


THE  LEADERS  OF  THE  PEOPLE  343 

indeed  was  so  thoroughly  popular  that  even  the  reactionaries 
were  forced  to  change  their  plan  for  organising  the  peasants  and 
to  adopt  the  Peasants'  Union  programme  almost  in  full,  with  the 
single  exception  of  ignoring  the  call  for  a  constitutional  assembly. 

The  founders  of  the  union  have  been  tried  and  condemned 
to  a  year's  imprisonment  by  the  Government.  That  the 
punishment  was  not  longer  is  owing  to  the  very  intelligent  and 
broad  attitude  that  these  men  took  in  their  work.  In  the  trial 
itself  it  was  made  thoroughly  clear  that  there  had  been  a  demand 
among  the  people  for  political  leadership  that  had  been  filled  by 
a  number  of  the  devoted  and  patriotic  "intellectuals"  of  the 
kind  I  have  mentioned.  These  intellectuals  proved  that  their 
principle  had  been  to  spread  among  the  peasantry  a  correct 
understanding  of  the  land  question.  One  leader,  Pieshekanov, 
defended  himself  in  the  trial  by  saying  that  there  were  only 
two  roads  to  be  chosen,  either  to  let  the  peasants  pour  by 
themselves  into  a  torrent  of  anarchistic  revolt,  or  to  take  the 
direction  of  the  movement  and  reduce  it  to  order.  It  was 
shown  in  the  trial  that  where  the  union  was  best  organised  the 
disorders  were  least;  and  I  myself  have  had  it  pointed  out  to 
me  by  the  peasants  that  the  union  and  the  revolutionary 
parties  try  to  restrain  them  from  revengeful  violence.  The 
peasants  told  me  of  an  incident  in  which  the  president  of  a  local 
government  board,  a  landlord,  the  guards  of  whose  estate  had 
fired  on  the  peasantry,  was  attacked  by  the  latter  and  sent  to 
town  to  secure  some  revolutionary  student  to  talk  to  the 
peasants  and  protect  him  from  their  revenge. 

Among  the  St.  Petersburg  members  of  the  union  a  new  and 
still  more  definitely  organised  party,  that  of  the  National 
Socialists,  took  its  origin.  The  Peasants'  Union  and  other 
revolutionary  organisations  had  successfully  taught  the  peasants 
that  they  must  look  forward  to  a  constitutional  assembly  and 
that  they  would  have  to  take  the  land  for  themselves.  I 
believe  that  this  new  organisation  may  possibly  find  the  correct 
solution  of  the  problem  of  the  distribution  of  the  land.  There 
is  no  doubt  that  each  of  the  parties  we  have  mentioned  will 
contribute  something  to  this  solution.  In  the  programmes 
both  of  the  Labour  Group  and  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary 
Party  one  of  the  measures  for  equalising  land  is  a  heavily 


344    '  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

graduated  land  tax  on  the  principle  of  Henry  George.  Miacotin, 
one  of  the  chief  leaders  of  the  new  party,  told  me  he  considered 
this  the  most  important  element  for  the  purpose  of  bringing  about 
the  desired  economic  equality ;  and  considering  the  enormous  diffi- 
culties of  the  actual  redistribution  of  land  itself  as  it  is  now  car- 
ried on  in  the  Russian  villages,  there  seems  no  doubt  that  this 
measure  will  be  the  one  on  which  ultimately  the  Socialist  and 
revolutionary  parties  will  all  unite.  The  Nationalist  Socialist 
Party  is  the  organisation  which  is  best  liked  by  all  the  other 
revolutionary  parties  at  considerable  rivalry  with  one  another. 
Although  the  democratic  Socialist  movement  that  has  em- 
bodied itself  in  the  Peasants'  Union,  the  Labour  Group  and 
the  National  Socialist  Party,  owes  its  theoretical  inspiration  to 
the  Socialist  Revolutionaries  and  its  real  origin  to  the  spon- 
taneous demands  of  the  people,  it  has  not  been  wanting  in 
leaders  among  the  chief  men  of  Russia.  Vladimir  Korolenko, 
whom  I  have  already  mentioned,  a  novelist  known  abroad  and 
beloved  by  every  Russian,  has  been  in  the  forefront  of  all  the 
great  movements  of  protest  in  which  Russia's  most  distinguished 
and  talented  names  have  figured.  Korolenko  has  for  years 
been  in  close  touch  with  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  movement 
and  is  now  considered  to  be  one  of  the  chief  leaders  of  the  new 
popular  Socialist  parties,  without,  of  course,  being  a  partisan 
of  any.  I  visited  him  in  his  home  in  Poltava  and  found  him 
looking  forward  to  a  greater  and  broader  and  more  profound 
revolutionary  movement  with  the  same  hopefulness  as  the  masses 
of  the  peasant  people.  He  was  under  no  illusions  as  to  immediate 
prospects,  realising  that  the  Government  had  succeeded  in 
imprisoning  or  exiling  the  brains  of  the  movement,  but  he  did 
not  consider  this  check  at  all  as  an  insuperable  calamity,  but 
rather  perhaps  even  as  a  piece  of  good  fortune  in  the  end.  To 
Korolenko  and  all  the  great  Russians  in  real,  close  and  sympa- 
thetic contact  with  the  people,  the  revolution  is  such  an  im- 
mense thing  that  it  ought  not  to  succeed  too  rapidly;  too  hasty 
victories  in  such  a  cause  would  necessarily  lead  to  latei  deteats. 
He  felt  that  the  great  thing  needed  was  organisation  in  the 
spirit  of  the  Peasants'  Union  and  the  Labour  Group  and  con- 
sidered that  tremendous  progress  had  already  been  made  in 
this  direction.     He  did  not  believe  that  any  amount  of  dis 


THE  LEADERS  OF  THE  PEOPLE  345 

organised  and  blind  revolt  could  do  anything  but  strengthen 
the  Government.  Far  from  agreeing  with  Milyoukov  that  the 
continuance  of  disorder  in  Russia  would  force  the  Government 
to  rely  on  the  reformers  to  straighten  things  out,  he  felt  that 
just  the  contrary  was  the  case  and  that  disorderly  revolt  could 
only  weaken  the  revolutionary  movement. 

Korolenko  is  an  excellent  type  of  Russia's  famous  men  who 
have  participated  in  the  popular  revolutionary  movement. 
Of  the  new  leaders  that  are  also  springing  up  plentifully  all  over 
the  country  each  of  the  Dumas  has  produced  a  score.  One  of 
the  most  influential  and  typical  is  Karaviev,  perhaps  the  most 
impressive  speaker  of  the  Labour  Group  in  the  second  Duma. 
When  a  youth  he  was  a  physician  to  the  local  government 
board  of  Perm.  Having  exposed  a  corrupt  judge,  the  latter 
tried  to  have  him  removed;  however  Karaviev's  peasant 
friends  were  so  outraged  that  they  threatened  to  kill  this 
official  if  the  measure  was  carried  out;  to  solve  the  difficulty 
Karaviev  removed  to  one  of  the  districts  of  the  St.  Petersburg 
provinces.  Again  he  was  arrested,  because  the  political  police 
had  decided  "that  he  was  too  popular  and  influential  and  that 
his  beliefs  were  dangerous  to  the  State."  No  other  accusations 
could  be  made  against  him;  indeed,  while  Karaviev  is  both  a 
revolutionary  and  a  Socialist,  he  belongs  to  the  moderate  wing 
of  the  movement  and  has  always  been  very  careful  in  his  public 
life.  It  happened  that  some  of  the  factories  situated  in  the 
district  where  he  was  living  at  this  time  (1897)  were  English, 
and  that  some  of  the  members  of  the  English  colony  were 
interested  in  him  and  secured  his  release  from  prison,  but  he 
was  forbidden  to  reside  in  any  industrial  province.  Without 
his  knowledge  the  peasants  of  the  neighbourhood  had  sent 
an  application  to  the  Czar  that  he  should  be  allowed  to  stay. 
Later  on  he  removed  to  Kharkov  in  the  south  of  Russia,  but  his 
persecution  by  no  means  ceased.  His  election  to  the  second  Duma 
and  the  prominent  part  he  played  in  it,  far  from  relieving  him  from 
petty   and  serious  police  persecutions,  have  made  them  worse. 

When  I  visited  him  in  the  summer  of  1907  he  had  just  had 
the  good  forttme  to  be  elected  as  physician  of  a  certain  factory 
hospital;  the  governor,  however,  had  notified  him  that  he 
would  remove  him  from  this  position  if  he  accepted  it.     Kara- 


346  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

viev,  it  must  be  remembered,  is  under  no  legal  process  of  any 
kind,  and  the  Government  has  never  been  able  to  formulate 
any  accusation  against  him.  He  had  decided  to  accept  the 
position  offered  in  defiance  of  the  governor.  I  have  no  doubt  that 
he  will  soon  end  in  Siberia,  but  persecution  everywhere  in  Russia 
is  now  so  bad  that  progressive  people  do  not  feel  it  is  of  any  tragic 
importance  where  they  live,  in  Siberia,  or  in  their  native  town. 

Karaviev  was  strongly  in  favour  of  a  peasant  party  entirely 
independent  of  the  theoretical  influence  of  the  Socialist  organi- 
sation, but  he  also  realised  that  the  Socialistic  and  revolutionary 
proposals  adopted  by  the  Peasants'  Union  were  of  a  thoroughly 
practical  character  and  applicable  to  the  present  condition  of 
the  country.  He  therefore  wished  the  peasants'  party  to  be 
headed  by  the  Peasants*  Union.  Although  he  thought  that 
the  peasants  felt  that  a  hereditary  ruler  was  a  sort  of  law  of 
nature,  he  was  certain  that  they  were  also  so  democratic  that, 
if  they  had  their  way,  they  would  so  qualify  and  limit  any 
monarchy  that  there  would  be  very  little  place  left  in  it  for  the 
Czar.  Besides,  he  had  noticed  that  an  anti-monarchical  senti- 
ment was  growing  up  very  rapidly  among  all  the  more  educated 
villagers.  He  thought  that  social  ideas  of  the  peasants  had 
gone  further  even  than  their  political  ideas  and  believed  that, 
if  political  equality  were  established.  Socialist  ideas  in  some 
practical  form  would  be  readily  accepted  by  the  whole  population. 

Like  Korolenko  he  was  hopeful  for  the  future.  He  thought 
there  was  much  promise  in  the  view  prevailing  among  the 
peasants  that,  after  a  few  years  when  the  army  was  composed 
entirely  of  new  recruits  sworn  by  the  villages  not  to  shoot  against 
the  people,  the  revolution  would  be  able  to  conquer;  and  he 
was  confident  that  the  peasants  now  purchasing  property 
through  the  Peasants*  Bank,  and  so  seemingly  accepting  the 
Governmental  land  reform,  would,  within  a  few  years,  revolt 
against  making  any  further  payments  and  accentuate  the 
revolutionary  situation. 

I  talked  with  many  other  leaders  of  this  class,  active  Duma 
members  in  thoroughly  intimate  contact  with  their  constit- 
uents. All  were  hopeful  of  a  renewal  of  the  revolutionary 
movement  within  a  few  years,  and  all  were  in  general  accord 
with  the  opinions  and  feelings  stated  by  the  peasants  themselves. 


part  five 
Revolution  and  the  Message 


CHAPTER    I 

THE    WORKINGMEN 

IF  THE  peasants  have  become  revolutionary  and  Socialistic, 
the  city  worldngmen,  better  paid,  better  educated,  and 
better  organised,  have  both  preceded  them  and  gone  further 
in  this  direction.  Indeed  the  most  important  events  of  the 
revolutionary  movement  up  to  the  present  have  been  brought 
about  solely  by  the  workingmen.  The  Czar's  promise  of  a 
national  assembly  was  forced  from  him  by  the  indignation  of 
Russia  and  the  whole  world  at  his  massacre,  on  January  22, 
1905  (Western  calendar),  of  the  courageous  workingmen  peti- 
tioners before  the  Winter  Palace  in  St.  Petersburg.  On  October 
30th  of  the  same  year  the  general  strike  instituted  by  the 
Railway  Union  wrung  from  the  reluctant  Czar  his  promise  of 
universal  suffrage  for  this  assembly  and  of  the  rights  of  man 
for  Russian  citizens.  All  these  promises  were  empty  phrases, 
but  nevertheless  the  most  momentous  political  acts  of  all 
Russian  history  up  to  the  present  day.  Having  gone  so  far, 
having  made  such  sacrifices,  and  having  won  such  a  moral 
victory  for  the  nation,  the  working  people  began  to  ask  some- 
thing for  themselves.  They  saw  it  was  possible  that  even 
imder  a  free  government,  if  it  fell  into  the  hands  of  other  social 
classes,  they  might  still  continue  to  starve. 

They  had  never  placed  a  mere  political  liberty  above  their 
hope  to  reach  a  position  where  they  might  cease  to  go  hungry. 
The  petition  of  January  2 2d  itself  was  the  result  of  a  strike 
for  better  wages  and  bearable  hours  of  labour.  The  national 
general  strike  was  instituted  by  the  Railway  Union  driven  to 
exasperation  because  the  Government  had  refused  it  the  ele- 
mentary right  to  organise  railway  employees  for  economic 
betterment.  The  Russian  workingmen  have  fought  not  only 
against  political  conditions  worse  than  those  of  other  countries, 

349 


3SO  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

but  also  against  an  equally  inferior  economic  sittiation.  They 
are  not  willing  to  give  up  their  lives  to  a  fight  jor  a  political 
freedom  that  would  not  bring  a  corresponding  economic  im- 
provement. 

The  Russian  working  people  are  for  the  most  part  able  to 
read  and  write.  For  many  years  the  country  has  been  in  such  a 
disturbed  condition  that  they  have  had  the  advantage  of  the 
leadership  not  only  of  the  intelligent  individuals  in  their  midst 
but  of  a  large  part  of  the  equally  revolutionary  educated  class 
who  have  turned  to  the  working  people  with  their  ideas  for 
political  and  social  regeneration  of  Russia.  They  have  come 
to  be  keenly  conscious  of  the  superior  conditions  of  working- 
men  in  other  countries,  and  at  the  same  time  of  all  the  social 
and  political  evils  against  which  labour  unions  and  social  parties 
everywhere  are  fighting.  They  have  found  much  matter  of 
vital  import  to  them  in  comparing  the  condition  of  their  country 
with  that  of  other  lands. 

They  found  that  the  American  workingmen,  with  the  aid  of 
education  and  modem  machinery,  are  producing  three  times, 
and  the  Englishmen  twice,  as  much  as  the  Russian,  that  the 
Englishmen  are  paid  four  and  the  American  five  times  as 
much  wages  per  hour,  while  the  cost  of  living  is  on  the  whole 
as  high  in  Russia  as  elsewhere.  The  meat  is  indeed  dearer, 
the  bread  is  as  dear,  and  only  clothes  are  cheap;  yet  the  aver- 
age yearly  wage  in  Russia  is  less  than  $100;  the  very  highest 
wages  in  any  industry  is  that  in  the  construction  of  machines, 
$262.50.  The  hours  are  longer  than  in  other  countries,  even 
if  we  take  into  account  in  reckoning  the  annual  working  time 
of  the  Russians  the  large  number  of  holidays.  The  hated  system 
of  company  stores  prevails  widely,  fines  are  in  very  wide  use, 
and  the  employers  pay  the  wages  at  such  times  as  they  think 
fit.  Worst  of  all  the  conditions,  perhaps,  is  the  fact  that  the 
factories  own  a  large  part  of  the  workingmen 's  homes  and  the 
overcrowding  is  greater  than  in  the  worst  tenement  districts 
in  New  York,  sometimes  several  families  being  put  into  a  single 
room.  Sometimes  the  homes  are  even  in  the  factories.  There 
are  labour  laws,  some  of  which  look  very  well  on  the  statute 
books.  However,  the  law  of  1897  about  hours  shortens  them 
only  to  eleven  and  a  half  and  is  poorly  enforced  at  that. 


THE  WORKINGMEN  351 

The  big  strikes  began  in  the  very  beginning  of  the  recent 
industrial  movement  in  Russia,  in  1885.  Conditions  at  that 
time  amounted  practically  to  slavery  and  the  result  was  a  sort 
of  anarchy  in  the  factories.  The  chief  cause  of  the  large  dis- 
turbances in  the  Moscow  district  in  1885  was  that  the  employers 
were  taking  back  from  the  working  people  of  the  Morosov  factory 
every  year  three  hundred  thousand  rubles,  or  nearly  40  per 
cent,  of  the  workingmen's  wages,  in  the  form  of  fines.  The 
strike  was  successftd  in  a  sense;  laws  were  passed  against  the 
fines  and  company  stores  and  irregularity  in  the  payment  of 
wages,  but  of  course  they  were  not  enforced.  The  strikes 
continued  to  grow  from  this  time,  until  in  St.  Petersburg  in  1896 
the  strike  of  the  weavers  was  so  serious  that  the  question  came 
up  in  a  conference  between  Finance  Minister  Witte  and  the  chief 
of  police  of  the  city,  Kleigels,  whether  it  would  be  practicable, 
under  modem  conditions,  to  force  workingmen,  like  slaves,  to 
their  work.  The  city  chief  of  poUce  answered  that  he  could 
force  workingmen  to  labour  "if  they  would  only  make  disturb- 
ances on  the  street,"  but  that  if  they  sat  quietly  at  home  he 
could  do  nothing  against  them.  As  a  result  of  this  strike  the 
eleven  and  a  half  hours  law  I  have  mentioned  was  written  on 
the  statute  books. 

All  the  strikes  during  the  recent  revolutionary  movement, 
both  before  and  after  the  St.  Petersburg  strike  that  led  to  the 
massacre,  have  had  as  part  of  their  object  shorter  hours  and 
higher  wages.  In  some  cases  the  hours  have  actually  been 
shortened  to  ten,  nine,  or  in  a  very  few  even  to  eight  hours. 
The  workingmen  have  felt  they  have  a  certain  power,  however 
large  the  reserve  army  of  starving  peasants  ready  to  take  their 
places,  or  the  army  of  police  ready  to  shoot  them  down.  They 
have  felt  at  the  same  time  that  this  power  rises  or  falls  with  the 
general  revolutionary  movement,  for  as  soon  as  the  Govern- 
ment began  to  get  the  upper  hand  during  1907  wages  were  again 
curtailed  and  hours  are  being  gradually  put  back  to  the  old 
level. 

Even  more  than  the  peasants,  then,  the  working  people  had 
a  social  element  in  their  revolutionary  programme.  Even 
before  the  meeting  of  the  first  Duma  they  had  arrived  at  a 
very  revolutionary  position,  demanding  no  mere  reform  of  any 


352  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

kind,  but  a  constitutional  assembly.  They  did  not  wait,  like 
the  peasants,  to  see  whether  the  Duma  succeeded  or  failed  in 
wringing  important  concessions  from  the  Czar;  they  wanted 
the  Czar  to  turn  over  the  Government  into  the  hands  of  the 
people,  and  they  felt  that  no  lesser  measure  would  give  them 
any  guarantee  of  the  promised  freedom. 

Soon  after  the  Labour  Group  was  formed  the  eleven  working- 
men  deputies  left  it.  They  were  not  satisfied  with  the  address 
of  the  Duma  to  the  Throne,  but  issued  another  of  their  own, 
in  which  they  accused  the  Czar  of  having  already  broken  his 
** sacred"  promises  of  the  October  Manifesto  of  only  a  few 
months  before,  and  of  having  lessened  rather  than  increased  the 
rights  of  the  people.  They  further  accused  the  Czar  in  issuing 
the  fundamental  laws  of  April  25,  1906,  of  having  attempted 
to  abolish  the  other  part  of  the  October  Manifesto,  viz.,  the 
promise  of  a  popular  Duma.  It  was  certainly  true  that  the 
power  given  to  the  Upper  Chamber  by  this  law  and  the 
restriction  of  the  Duma's  rights  over  the  budget  left  the  latter 
practically  no  power  whatever.  The  workingmen's  represen- 
tatives demanded  again  immediate  amnesty  for  all  political 
prisoners,  liberty  and  justice  for  those  who  had  fought  against 
the  Government.  They  further  asserted  that  the  great  land 
question  could  not  be  rightfully  decided  by  the  present  Duma, 
elected  on  restricted  suffrage,  but  must  be  turned  over  to  an- 
other Duma  elected  by  equal  votes  of  all  the  people.  They 
concluded  that  the  only  purpose  of  the  first  Duma,  its  only 
raison  d'etre,  was  to  pass  a  universal  suffrage  law,  and  they 
declared  that  this  must  be  done  speedily  if  it  was  to  be  done 
peacefully. 

The  workingmen  had  reached  the  extreme  revolutionary 
position  without  having  to  learn  anything  from  the  Dumas. 
The  majority  of  the  peasants  only  reached  it  after  the  dissolu- 
tion of  the  first  Duma,  and  a  considerable  part  is  only  just  now 
learning  to  take  this  advanced  position.  Not  only  had  the 
workingmen  reached  this  point,  but  the  overwhelming  ma- 
jority were  already  republicans.  The  Social  Democratic 
Party,  to  which  most  of  them  belong,  demanded  not  only  an 
immediate  trial  of  "those  bloody  murderers,  the  ministers 
and  the  Czar,"  but  also  the  abolition  of  the  monarchy  once 


THE  WORKINGMEN  353 

for  all.  It  asserted  before  the  meeting  of  the  first  Duma  that 
all  the  ministers  were  simply  the  Czar's  servants,  and  that  he, 
therefore,  must  be  held  strictly  responsible  for  all  the  outrages 
they  committed. 

The  workingmen  of  Russia  would  be  glad  to  secure  the  half- 
freedom  of  the  workingmen  of  other  countries,  or  even  of 
the  United  States,  but  they  are  not  ready  to  die  for  it.  They 
did  not  have  themselves  shot  down  on  the  22nd  of  January, 
executed  by  hundreds  in  Moscow,  Riga,  and  Odessa,  imprisoned 
by  thousands  in  every  Russian  jail,  and  exiled  to  the  deserts 
and  the  arctic  regions,  in  exchange  for  the  doubtful  privi- 
leges of  the  workingmen  of  Goldfield  or  Cripple  Creek.  They 
knew  these  American  stories ;  I  have  heard  them  from  their  own 
lips.  I  have  talked  with  labour  leaders  of  all  the  factions — • 
pure  and  simple  unionists,  revolutionary  Socialists,  independent 
Socialists,  and  Social  Democrats,  members  of  the  Duma,  and 
the  practical  leaders  of  the  great  Railway  Union.  They  were 
all  agreed  that  our  political  institutions  are  much  preferable 
to  their  own,  but  they  were  not  very  anxious  to  exchange  one 
despot  for  another.  The  enthusiasm  with  which  they,  more 
than  any  other  class  in  Russia,  throw  away  their  lives  is  due 
to  the  great  hope  that  they  may  not  exchange  the  despotism 
of  the  Czar  for  a  despotism  of  private  capital.  No  faction 
has  any  idea  of  the  immediate  creation  of  a  Socialist  state,  but 
every  faction  hopes  that  the  Russian  working  class,  if  it  once 
makes  possible  the  greatest  revolution  of  the  world's  history, 
will  demand  such  a  voice  in  the  reborn  nation  as  to  make  it 
impossible  that  the  new  Government  should  be  dominated  by 
a  handful  of  capitalists. 

For  a  short  while  it  looked  as  if  labour  might  combine  with 
capital  against  the  Czar.  After  the  22nd  of  January,  employers 
cooperated  for  a  time  with  the  workmen,  and  the  workmen  with 
employers,  in  a  common  cause  against  the  Government.  The 
strikes  at  that  time  had  almost  without  exception  a  political 
character.  Many  employers  freely  paid  for  waiting  time 
during  these  purely  political  strikes,  a  direct  subsidy  to  the 
revolution.  Even  during  the  Moscow  barricades  several  of 
the  largest  manufacturers  openly  or  secretly  supported  the 
insurrection.       But    now    the    situation   has   cleared    and    the 


354  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Russian  revolution,  the  only  great  revolution  the  world  has 
seen  since  the  rise  of  modem  capitalism,  is  directed  as  much 
against  landlordism  and  capitalism  as  it  is  against  the  Czar. 
For  the  Czar,  by  the  "fundamental  laws  "  of  April  25th,  invented 
an  improved  style  of  American  Senate.  Half  the  members  of 
this  august  body  are  elected  by  employers,  landlords,  bankers, 
and  clergymen  —  half  appointed  by  the  Czar.  For  fear  the 
Duma  might  do  something  popular  this  second  body  shares  the 
power.  The  employers  were  finally  cured  of  their  revolution- 
ism by  this  measure,  for  from  the  capitalistic  standpoint  the 
new  body  was  an  ideal  representation  of  the  nation.  When  a 
few  months  later  the  second  Duma  was  dissolved  and  a  third 
created  almost  in  the  image  of  this  Senate,  or  Council  of  the 
Empire,  the  capitalists  became  enthusiastic  supporters  of  the 
"new"  Government.  The  workingmen's  unions  and  political 
parties,  which  never  had  anything  but  suspicion  toward  their 
self -professed  ally,  were  at  least  in  the  fortunate  position  of 
having  both  their  opponents,  absolutism  and  capitalism,  in  a 
single    camp. 

Witte  saw  the  danger  that  the  workingmen  would  demand  a 
share  in  the  political  power  of  the  future  Russian  Government 
which  his  friends,  the  capitaHsts,  would  be  unwilling  to  con* 
cede,  and  did  not  fail  to  try  to  thwart  it.  He  advised  the  labour 
leaders  to  leave  politics  alone.  He  favoured  purely  economic 
action  for  his  "brother  workingmen,"  as  he  styled  them.  As 
much  class  struggle  as  you  please,  but  no  class  politics! 

When  I  called,  Witte  referred  me  to  his  Minister  of  Commerce 
(and  Labor)  Timiriaseff ,  with  orders  to  the  latter  to  talk  freely 
for  the  benefit  of  the  American  workingman.  Mr.  Timiriaseff 
believed,  he  said,  in  the  widest  possible  democracy  —  much 
beyond  the  "  checks  and  balances  "  of  the  American  Constitution. 
He  believed  in  cabinet  government;  that  is,  that  every  execu- 
tive should  be  always  and  forever  responsible  to  the  legislative 
power  —  an  idea  that,  put  into  the  American  Constitution, 
might  do  much  to  restrain  the  unbridled  conservatism  of  our 
elected  executives  and  the  judges,  their  appointees.  He  believed 
in  many  kinds  of  labour  legislation,  such  as  a  legal  maximum 
for  the  working  day  and  workingmen's  insurance.  He  believed, 
in  fact,  in  everything  the  workingmen  wanted,  but  he  did  n't 


THE  WORKINGMEN  355 

want  them  to  take  it  themselves.  He  explained  the  benevolence 
of  the  new  Government,  which  was  ready  to  do  everything,  and 
showed  how  he  and  Witte  had  fought  in  the  cabinet  for  tolera- 
tion of  "good"  unions  (the  non-revolutionary  ones).  It  was 
not  Witte,  he  explained,  but  the  Czar's  pet  minister,  Dumovo, 
chief  of  police,  gendarmes  and  spies,  that  had  not  even  per- 
mitted these  pious  unions  to  hold  a  single  meeting.  Witte  him- 
self would  have  had  them  given  every  privilege. 

Here  was  Mr.  Witte's  scheme  to  foil  the  revolution.  The 
workingmen  were  to  be  divided  into  two  parts  —  the  wild 
and  the  tame.  The  wild,  he  said  to  a  friend  of  mine,  those 
who  were  not  satisfied  with  his  benevolent  efforts,  were  to  be 
killed  or  caged,  "like  the  wild  beasts  they  were."  The  tame 
were  to  be  further  tamed.  First  came  Gapon  with  his  30,000 
rubles  subsidy  for  restoring  the  workingmen's  clubs,  under 
police  supervision  to  be  sure.  But  Gapon  was  inconvenient  for 
the  taming.  He  played  such  a  hidden  game  —  either  very  deep 
and  subtle  or  else  very  oily  and  false  —  that  he  was  trusted 
neither  by  the  watchful  workmen  nor  by  the  watchful  police. 
His  long,  involved  career  is  of  more  interest  to  the  searcher 
for  clever  plots  for  novels  than  it  is  to  the  serious  public.  He 
stands  for  no  great  clear  idea,  and  he  spent  the  last  year  of  his 
life  trying  in  vain  to  explain  himself. 

Gapon 's  successor  was  Ushakoff,  with  whom  I  have  talked 
frequently  and  at  length.  He  certainly  considered  himself  an 
honest  man,  though  he  has  taken  Witte's  money  for  his  move- 
ment. But  labour  did  not  fall  into  the  trap.  Ushakoff,  as  it 
happened,  took  more  money  than  he  was  willing  to  confess. 
Exactly  like  one  of  the  Gapon  troop,  he  turned  it  over  to  the 
union,  but  he  was  ashamed  to  turn  it  over  in  Witte's  name. 
The  real  origin  of  the  money  was  discovered,  and  his  movement 
was  ruined.  The  Russian  workman,  his  eyes  more  widely 
opened,  now  decided  to  keep  his  hands  clean  of  Count  Witte's 
benevolence.  Later,  when  independent  labour  parties  and 
unions  appeared,  condemning  both  Gapon  and  Ushakoff,  but 
satisfied  with  political  conditions  and  permitted  by  the  Rus- 
sian Government,  this  was  enough  in  itself  to  condemn  them 
in  the  eyes  of  the  honest  workman.  So  the  tottering  liberal 
(capitalistic)  ministry  had  at  last  to  give  up  its  attempt  to 


356  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

defeat  the  revolutionising  of  the  working  class  by  terrorising 
its  more  active  part  and  cajoling  and  deceiving  the  timid  and 
ignorant. 

The  Russian  workingman  is  revolutionary,  but  he  is  neither 
violent,  dogmatic,  nor  unintelligent.  He  is  ready  for  barri- 
cades, but  he  has  studied  them,  and  alone  of  the  workmen  of 
the  world  he  has  learned  about  them  from  actual  experience. 
He  believes  in  the  class  struggle.  He  is  ready  and  willing  to 
fight  his  oppressor,  the  capitalist  class,  to  the  finish.  But  he 
does  not  ignore  the  existence  of  still  other  classes.  He  merely 
asks  that  the  other  classes  take  one  side  or  the  other  in  the  bitter 
conflict  that  draws  so  near. 

He  is  unwilling  to  antagonise  the  agricultural  classes,  the 
peasants,  though  they  may  not  always  agree  with  him;  he 
hopes  rather  to  secure  a  common  basis  of  action.  There  are 
many  orthodox  Marxists  in  Russia,  but  the  great  mass  of  the 
Russian  workmen  do  not  expect  the  peasants  to  disappear, 
absorbed  either  in  the  capitalist  or  working  class,  according  to 
the  stricter  Marxist  formula.  Far  from  expecting  the 
increasing  lower  middle  classes  of  the  cities  to  disappear,  the 
workingmen  invited  their  aid  to  build  barricades  and  carry 
out  the  general  strike  —  and  the  Moscow  insurrection  was 
carried  on  not  alone  by  workmen  but  by  students,  clerks,  office 
workers.  Government  employees,  teachers,  doctors,  engineers. 
The  majority  faction  of  the  Social  Democratic  Party  (the  pro- 
gressive and  more  Russian  part)  having  seen  this  light,  is  now 
for  cooperation  with  these  "little  bourgeois." 

The  Railway  Union,  which  formed  the  heart  and  core  of 
the  great  October  general  strike,  realises  that  the  success 
even  of  a  general  strike  does  not  depend  on  the  working  class 
alone.  For  if  the  October  strike  won  the  Manifesto,  the  De- 
cember strike,  at  the  time  of  the  Moscow  barricades,  failed. 
The  workingmen  of  the  cities  joined  the  strike,  but  it  was 
only  in  Moscow  that  the  whole  mass  of  the  population, 
excepting  only  the  rich  and  privileged,  was  thoroughly  roused. 
The  Railway  Union  has  proved  itself  wise.  It  favoured,  the 
October  strike  and  the  strike  was  won.  It  opposed  the  Decem- 
ber strike  and  the  strike  was  lost.  It  realises  fully  the  enor- 
mous cost  and  danger  of  tying  up  the  transportation  of  a  great 


FATHER    GAPON 
Killed  by  enraged  workingmen  for  tr>'ing  to  buy  them  for  the  Government 


JY  ^  C      THE        '^ 

VERSITY 


TYPE    OF    A    RUSSIAN    WORKINGMAN 


THE  WORKINGMEN  357 

country.  Its  wisdom  consists  in  knowing  that  if  the  popula- 
tion is  not  thoroughly  with  the  strike,  the  strike  will  fail.  It 
does  not  oppose  a  new  strike,  but  it  proposes  to  wait  until 
success  is  assured. 

The  railway  men  and  the  labour  movement  at  large  have  not 
lost  their  heads.  In  October,  1905,  they  showed  the  world 
the  first  great  example  of  a  successful  general  strike  on  a  national 
scale.  At  the  first  stroke  they  secured  the  Manifesto  —  the 
first  promise  of  freedom  ever  wrung  from  the  Czar.  The  next 
stroke  is  to  be  for  nothing  less  than  the  final  sovereignty  of  the 
people,  in  place  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  Czar  —  who,  if  he  is 
kept  at  all,  will  retain  little  more  than  his  name.  The  work- 
men are  as  one  man  in  their  demand  for  a  constitution,  and  they 
know  they  will  have  to  force  it  by  revolution  —  "open,  violent 
rebellion"  as  Carlyle  defines  it. 

But  they  propose  to  make  this  revolution  as  speedy  and 
orderly  as  it  can  be  made,  and  for  this  end  they  propose  one 
more  great  general  strike.  The  working  people,  having  forced 
the  Czar  to  promise  freedom,  propose  now  to  force  him  to  make 
his  promise  good.  It  is  to  be  a  class  struggle  against  officials, 
landlords,  and  employers.  But  the  working  class  will  not 
antagonise  any  other  class  except  that  of  the  rich  and  privileged. 
The  Russian  labour  movement  is  under  no  delusions  as  to  the 
"benevolence"  of  the  employing  class,  but  it  does  not  extend 
its  hatred  to  every  other  class  outside  its  ranks.  In  the  next 
great  revolutionary  crisis  behind  the  rejected  working  people 
will  be  found  the  great  mass  of  the  intelligent  city  population  of 
Russia  —  all  those  not  held  back  by  private  interests,  privi- 
leges, or  public  office,  and  above  all,  the  overwhelming  majority 
of  her  agricultural  population  of  a  hundred  million  souls. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN 

IMMEDIATELY  after  the  great  general  strike  the  labour 
unions  and  the  Socialist  parties  became  at  once  aware  that 
the  promises  in  the  Czar's  Manifesto  had  no  real  value.  If 
there  were  any  illusions  they  did  not  last  beyond  the  massacres 
of  the  second  day;  most  of  the  leaders  were  thoroughly  con- 
scious of  the  emptiness  of  the  victory  from  the  first  moment 
they  heard  the  Manifesto  and  saw  that  it  was  a  compromise 
that  left  all  the  actual  power  in  the  hands  of  the  Czar.  That 
the  next  movement  would  have  to  be,  not  a  peaceful  general 
strike,  but  an  insurrection,  was  realised  fully  by  the  famous 
Council  of  Labour  Deputies. 

In  St.  Petersburg  and  many  other  places  the  insurrection- 
strike  that  followed  was  a  complete  fiasco,  but  in  Moscow  the 
revolutionaries  succeeded  with  a  little  body  of  armed  men,  far 
inferior  numerically  to  the  army  to  which  they  were  opposed, 
and  with  the  aid  of  the  population,  in  holding  for  several  days 
large  portions  of  Moscow.  They  were  without  cavalry,  without 
artillery,  and  the  great  majority  were  without  discipline;  the 
trained  revolutionary  militia  formed  a  very  small  part  of  the 
whole.  Their  success  was  due  to  the  enthusiastic  support  of 
the  population.  If  the  revolutionary  militia  consisted  of 
workingmen  with  a  certain  proportion  of  students  and  pro- 
fessional Socialist  leaders,  the  barricades  were  built  by  work- 
ingmen, servants,  clerks,  engineers,  lawyers,  and  members  of 
the   professional   class. 

A  great  lesson  remains  fixed  in  the  minds  of  all  the  revo- 
lutionists, especially  of  the  workingmen  —  the  possible  suc- 
cess of  guerilla  tactics  in  a  modern  city.  It  was  because^ the 
population  could  safely  aid  the  revolutionary  militia  without 
being  caught;  because  the  arms  could  be  passed  from  hand  to 
hand,  so  that  one  gun  did  the  service  of  three,  and  the  military 

358 


THE  POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN  359 

had  no  rest;  because  of  the  impossibility  of  the  Government's 
deciding  which  house-owner  was  terrorised  into  aiding  the  revo- 
lutionists and  which  was  glad  to  do  so;  because  of  the  possi- 
bility of  the  sudden  transformation  of  a  peaceful  citizen  into 
a  revolutionist  and  a  revolutionist  into  a  peaceful  citizen  at 
a  moment's  notice  and  without  the  least  chance  of  detection  — 
it  was  because  of  these  conditions  that  the  revolutionists  per- 
formed their  astounding  feat.  In  a  week  were  belied  the 
theories  of  a  whole  generation  of  revolutionary  but  timid 
European  Socialists  and  a  century  of  military  dogmas  on  the 
hopelessness  of  insurrection.  The  spontaneous  and  universal 
use  of  guerilla  tactics  by  the  revolutionaries  and  the  assistance 
of  a  large  part  of  the  people  of  Moscow  came  near  placing  the 
second  city  of  a  great  empire  in  the  hands  of  the  revolutionists. 
In  other  sections  of  the  country  where  the  whole  popula- 
tion had  for  many  months  been  preparing  for  an  armed  insurrec- 
tion, the  movement,  also  guided  by  the  workingmen,  was  more 
difficult  to  conquer.  In  one  part  of  the  Empire  it  even  had  a 
complete  victory,  and  the  Czar  has  not  yet  been  able  to  force 
this  section  under  the  old  servitude.  In  the  Finnish,  as  in 
the  other  insurrectionary  movements  of  which  I  have  been 
speaking,  the  working  people  played  by  far  the  most  important 
part.  Aided  by  the  "Red  Guard,'  entirely  under  the  leader- 
ship of  workingmen  and  Socialists,  moderately  well  supplied 
with  arms  and  supported  by  nearly  all  classes  of  the  population, 
the  revolutionists  were  able  to  abolish  entirely  the  Czar's 
Government,  to  remove  the  Russian  officials  and  police  and 
to  establish  Finns  in  their  stead.  It  is  well  known  that  the 
Finnish  revolutionary  movement  was  orderly  from  the  outset, 
that  there  was  no  unnecessary  bloodshed  and  that  there  has 
been  none  since.  The  Czar's  Government,  occupied  seriously 
with  other  insurrectionary  movements  in  the  heart  of  the  Em- 
pire, conceded  nearly  everything,  and  for  a  while  there  was 
no  freer  country  in  Europe.  Now  the  Red  Guard  has  been  dis- 
banded, but  the  Finnish  people  have  learned  a  lesson  and 
if  there  is  any  sign  of  revolutionary  movement  in  Russia  they 
will  undoubtedly  at  once  undertake  active  measures  for  the 
defence  and  recovery  of  their  liberties  now  being  gradually 
stolen  away. 


36o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Similar  revolutionary  movements  of  the  overwhelming  major- 
ity of  the  population,  under  the  leadership  of  the  working 
classes,  placed  considerable  parts  of  Poland  and  the  Caucasus 
for  a  time  in  the  hands  of  the  people.  But  with  the  aid  of 
armies  of  50,000  and  150,000  men  these  movements  were  com- 
pletely suppressed.  The  movements  in  both  these  regions  were 
on  the  whole  orderly  and  humane,  while  the  Government 
repressions  were  savage  and  barbarous  from  the  first  moment. 

The  intelligent  classes  in  both  sections  saw  that  the  rule 
of  the  revolutionary  committees  was  in  many  respects  better 
than  the  former  rule  of  the  police.  The  systematic  lynching 
of  thieves  and  the  deliberate  destruction  of  houses  of  ill-repute 
by  the  revolutionists  did  more  for  the  good  of  Warsaw  than 
years  of  its  miserable,  inefficient,  and  corrupt  police,  often 
in  league  with  the  thieves  and  souteneurs  and  occupied  almost 
entirely  with  the  oppression  of  political  suspects.  The  Govern- 
ment has  occupied,  rather  than  conquered,  these  two  regions, 
and  it  does  not  dare  to  remove  any  considerable  part  of  the 
occupying  forces.  The  people  are  not  defeated,  but  only  wait- 
ing until  the  Russian  people  are  ready  to  renew  the  war  against 
the  Czar. 

The  same  revolutionary  committees  were  also  conducting  the 
only  schools  and  classes  to  be  found  during  the  height  of  the 
movement.  When  all  the  schools  were  closed  and  all  the 
scholars,  from  little  children  to  students  of  law,  medicine,  and 
engineering,  were  on  strike,  the  Socialists  were  conducting 
secret  evening  classes  in  reading  and  writing  for  the  neglected 
children  of  the  workers,  and  secret  evening  courses  in  these  and 
other  subjects  for  the  adults.  And  for  years  every  evening 
literally  hundreds  of  these  circles,  necessarily  confined  to  a 
dozen  pupils  or  less  for  fear  of  the  police,  have  gathered  in  every 
comer  of  Warsaw,  taught  by  the  students  of  the  universities 
and  higher  schools,  by  young  men  of  the  professional  classes, 
by  young  salesmen  and  clerks. 

The  schools  are  only  a  small  part  of  the  education  the  rev- 
olutionists provide.  There  are  secret  revolutionary  pamphlets 
by  the  million,  and  even  many  regular  revolutionary  journals, 
the  only  truly  popular  newspapers,  which  handle  every  sort 
of  political,  economic,  and  social  question  under  the  direction 


THE  POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN  361 

of  university-bred  editors  and  contributors.  The  innumerable 
Government  prosecutions  have  failed  utterly  to  hold  this  flood 
of  printed  matter  back. 

Simultaneously  with  this  great  educational  movement,  both 
in  Poland  and  throughout  Russia  generally,  the  revolutionary 
movement  enabled  the  working  people  to  organise  into  large  and 
successful  trade  unions  in  spite  of  the  prohibitions  and  persecu- 
tions of  the  Government.  Wages  were  raised  and  hours  short- 
ened, until  sometimes  the  wages  were  50  per  cent,  more  than 
before.  From  any  standpoint  of  the  public  welfare  or  the  best 
economic  interests  of  the  country  at  large,  this  movement  must 
be  considered  entirely  a  progressive  and  profitable  one.  As 
soon  as  the  Government  once  more  secured  the  upper  hand 
the  unions  were  again  suppressed,  until  now  membership  in 
nearly  any  union  in  Russia  is  a  crime  under  the  law.  Doubtless 
the  Government  from  its  point  of  view  is  quite  right  in  reaching 
this  decision,  since  it  is  impossible  to  imagine  that  any  labour 
organisation  could  long  continue  under  the  present  Government 
without  deciding  to  fight  it  to  the  death. 

During  the  revolutionary  movement  the  peaceful  construc- 
tive work  of  organising  the  working  people,  not  only  in  trade 
unions  but  in  cooperative  organisations,  has  gone  on  much  more 
rapidly  than  before.  Just  as  the  Government  has  destroyed 
the  unions  and  attacked  the  tremendously  successful  "People's 
Universities"  or  university  extension  movements  as  danger- 
ous to  the  State,  so  have  the  reactionary  organisations  proposed 
that  the  Government  should  either  close  by  force,  or  put  out  of 
business  by  subsidised  competition,  the  astonishingly  success- 
ful cooperative  movement  that  began  recently  in  St.  Petersburg. 
There  are  already  thousands  of  these  workingmen's  cooperative 
stores,  just  as  there  are  thousands  of  secret  classes  to  which 
the  teachers  and  professors  of  the  country,  nearly  all  public- 
spirited  men,  are  freely  giving  their  time.  It  is  certain  that  both 
of  these  movements  are  untinged  by  any  direct  political  ob- 
ject; it  is  equally  certain  that  the  Government  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  safety  of  autocracy,  is  right  that  anything  that 
elevates  the  condition  of  the  working  people  or  increases  their 
intelligence  is  likely  soon  to  become  an  imminent  danger  to  the 
Czarism. 


362  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

It  has,  of  course,  been  realised  that  the  support  of  the  army 
must  be  secured,  and  of  the  numerous  mutinies  that  have  occur- 
red from  Vladivostock  to  Sebastopol,  Riga,  and  Cronstadt, 
nearly  all  have  been  brought  about  principally  by  workingmen 
agitators  and  by  such  elements  of  the  army  as  have  been  com- 
posed largely  of  workingmen,  The  reason  for  the  mutinies 
that  all  but  put  the  fleets  both  of  the  Black  and  Baltic  seas 
into  the  hands  of  the  revolutionists  was  that  sailors  are  also 
workingmen  and  in  close  touch  with  the  rest  of  the  working 
classes.  Even  the  conservative  wing  of  the  Social  Democrats 
has  always  favoured  agitation  in  the  army  and  hoped  that  the 
Government  might  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  people  through 
widespread  army  rebellion.  The  prosecution  of  the  fifty 
deputies  of  the  Social  Democratic  Party  of  the  second  Duma, 
which  was  used  by  the  Government  as  a  pretext  for  dissolving 
the  Duma  when  it  refused  to  turn  over  the  deputies  to  the 
courts,  was  based  on  the  fact  of  this  army  agitation.  The  trial 
has  now  taken  place;  a  third  of  these  deputies  have  been  sen- 
tenced to  hard  labour  in  the  mines  and  another  third  exiled, 
while  only  a  very  few  have  gone  entirely  without  punishment. 

But  these  mutinies,  isolated  from  one  another,  occurring 
also  at  different  times,  never  succeeded  even  in  gaining  the 
whole  garrison  to  their  side.  This  was  a  necessary  result  of  the 
propaganda  as  carried  on  by  the  workingmen 's  parties;  the  pro- 
paganda among  soldiers  already  enlisted  was  necessarily  a  bar- 
racks propaganda  and  necessarily  dealt  largely  with  the  con- 
ditions of  the  soldiers  themselves,  which  varied  greatly  from 
regiment  to  regiment,  and  town  to  town.  The  leaders  of  the 
agitation  soon  saw  two  great  necessities.  One  was  to  convert 
the  soldiers  before  they  enlisted,  so  that  they  would  understand 
that  they  were  fighting,  not  for  temporary  or  small  military 
evils,  but  for  a  great  national  cause.  Another  was  to  secure 
some  form  of  common  movement  between  the  army  and  the 
rest  of  the  people,  without  which  no  mutiny  could,  of  course, 
ever  develop  into  a  national  revolutionary  movement.  But 
before  these  lessons  were  learned  hundreds  of  persons  had  been 
executed  and  thousands  sent  to  hard  labour  for  their  lives  for 
agitation  in  the  barracks.  The  parties  now  know  very  well 
that  no  army  movement,  any  more  than  a  general  strike,  can 


THE   POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN  363 

succeed  until  the  general  state  of  public  feeling  has  reached  an 
extremely  acute  stage.  They  know  that  no  revolution  can  be 
planned  beforehand ;  but  they  propose  to  be  as  ready  as  possible 
when  the  psychological  moment  has  arrived.  Unfortunately, 
a  certain  difficulty  still  exists  between  the  workingmen's  and 
the  peasants'  organisations.  It  is  well  understood  that  co- 
operation is  necessary  but  some  of  the  workingmen's  parties, 
especially  those  composed  largely  of  "intellectuals,"  feel  that 
in  the  general  movement  the  working  people  should  have  the 
leading  r6le.  This  seems  a  very  wrong  attitude,  since  the 
peasants  in  Russia  are  five  times  more  numerous  than  all 
other  working  classes. 

The  organisations  that  were  initiated  and  managed  by  the 
workingmen  themselves  with  the  minimum  of  assistance  from 
outsiders  have  always  shown  a  very  friendly  spirit  toward 
the  peasantry.  Most  remarkable  of  such  organisations  were 
doubtless  the  Councils  of  Labour  Deputies,  purely  revolutionary 
or  insurrectionary  bodies,  that  arose  after  the  general  strike 
and  before  the  Government  had  again  seized  firmly  the  reins 
of  power.  These  organisations  were  of  a  purely  Socialist 
character  but  they  were  at  the  same  time  strictly  non-partisan 
and  took  care  not  to  develop  a  too  definite  political  programme; 
they  were  composed  of  workingmen  but  they  were  not  by  any 
means  labour  unions,  or  even  a  federation  of  labour  unions. 
They  were  nothing  more  nor  less  than  a  framework  for  a 
revolutionary  government,  perhaps  some  vague  foreshadowing 
of  what  may  develop  into  a  very  real  power  in  some  future 
revolutionary  moment.  It  is  largely  on  account  of  experience 
with  these  organisations  that  the  Government  hesitates  to 
allow  any  labour  association  of  any  kind  and  continually  fluctu- 
ates between  two  equally  impossible  policies.  First  it  forbids 
all  unions,  but  this  only  leads  to  the  more  rapid  development 
of  conspirative  parties  and  every  form  of  violence,  as  well 
as  that  disorganisation  of  industry  which  now  exists  at  Odessa, 
Lodz,  and  many  other  places.  Urged,  then,  by  the  employers 
themselves,  and  perhaps  by  the  small  moderate  element  among 
the  workingmen,  the  Government  decides  to  tolerate  loyal  and 
peaceful  unions,  but  it  has  no  sooner  done  this  for  a  few  months 
than  these  organisations,  outraged  at  every  point  by  the  pre- 


364  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

vailing  despotism,  turn  into  purely  revolutionary  associations. 
It  was  the  Council  of  Labour  Deputies  to  a  large  degree  that 
taught  the  working  people  their  power  and  placed  the  Govern- 
ment in  the  dilemma  from  which  it  can  find  no  issue. 

The  Councils  of  Labour  Deputies  have  usually  taken  a  broad 
national  view  of  the  revolutionary  movement,  cooperating  in 
the  fullest  way,  for  instance,  with  the  Peasants'  Union.  Far 
from  taking  their  leaders  from  the  Socialist  parties,  they  have 
rather  given  those  parties  some  of  their  most  active  organisers. 
Such  an  example  is  Khrustalev,  a  figure  so  important  and  also  so 
typical  of  the  organisers  of  the  labour  movement  in  general  that 
I  have  obtained  from  him  a  personal  statement  of  his  life. 

Khrustalev,  more  correctly  Nossar,  was  a  peasant's  son  from 
the  province  of  Poltava.  His  father  had  become  a  Tolstoian 
and  was  sentenced  to  exile  for  twenty  years  by  the  Government, 
though  he  was  allowed  to  return  under  police  supervision.  His 
home  was  the  centre  of  all  revolutionary  thought  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood and  the  young  man  was  early  surrounded  by  every 
shade  of  revolutionist.  As  a  Tolstoian  his  father  demanded 
that  he  should  work  with  his  hands.  He  was  employed  at  times 
by  his  landlord  and  at  times  attended  a  board  school. 

At  this  period,  the  early  nineties,  the  revolutionary  move- 
ment existed  chiefly  among  the  students,  and  young  Nossar 
was  urged  to  become  one  in  order  to  carry  on  agitation.  The 
police,  knowing  his  revolutionary  environment,  wished  to 
prevent  his  entrance  to  the  high  school,  but  the  director  was 
a  friend  of  peasant  and  self-taught  students  and  he  was 
accepted.  In  1897  he  was  one  of  the  organisers  of  a  students' 
congress.  The  police  insisted  on  his  being  expelled  from  the 
school  but  he  was  allowed  first  to  graduate.  He  then  went  to 
St.  Petersburg  and  entered  the  university.  The  first  great 
students'  strike  took  place  in  1898,  and  for  having  aided  in  the 
organisation  of  the  national  movement  he  was  kept  three  months 
in  prison.  It  was  at  this  time  that  he  changed  from  the  radical 
people's  party,  of  which  Korolenko  was  at  that  time  the  leader, 
and  joined  the  Social  Democratic  organisation,  which,  with  its 
rich  German  literature,  has  always  been  popular  among  the 
student  class. 

He  was  exiled  to  South  Russia,  took  part  there  in  the  organi- 


A    CORNER   OF   OLD    MOSCOW 


^  he         ' 


PRINCE    KROPOTKIN 
Greatest  living  enemy  of  coercive  government 


THE  POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN  365 

sation  of  unions,  a  workingman's  party,  and  a  workingman's 
paper.  Later  he  went  to  the  Caucasus  and  tried  to  organise 
a  railroad  union  and  only  escaped  another  imprisonment 
because  he  was  employed  as  tutor  to  the  son  of  the  pros- 
ecuting attorney.  The  latter  advised  him  to  leave.  He 
returned  to  St.  Petersburg  to  continue  his  studies,  but  the  police 
interfered  and  exiled  him  to  Yaroslav,  where  he  passed  his  law 
examinations  and  received  the  rights  of  citizen  and  the  privi- 
lege of  holding  a  chair  at  the  university,  providing,  of  course, 
he  could  secure  a  vacancy. 

In  1904,  returning  again  to  St.  Petersburg,  he  met  Gapon 
and  took  a  prominent  part  in  the  movement  that  led  to  the 
general  strike  in  St.  Petersburg  and  the  massacre  of  the  work- 
ing people  on  January  22  d.  It  was  at  this  time  that  he  got 
his  name  of  Khrustalev.  When,  after  the  massacre,  the  working- 
men  were  allowed  to  elect  a  delegation  to  deal  with  the  employers, 
Nossar  was  elected  as  a  member,  but  since  he  was  not  a  work- 
ingman  he  could  not  serve.  Offered  his  place  by  a  workingman, 
Khrustalev,  Nossar  assumed  the  workingman's  name  and  has 
since  borne  it.  The  members  of  the  commission  were  all  ar- 
rested, among  others  Nossar.  He  stayed  two  months  in  prison 
and  was  condemned  to  eight  years  hard  labour  in  Siberia.  In 
the  meanwhile  he  was  exiled  to  Kharkov.  But  at  the  first  sta- 
tion out  from  St.  Petersburg  he  left  the  train  and  returned. 
In  St.  Petersburg  he  was  again  arrested,  again  kept  two  months 
in  prison,  again  exiled,  this  time  under  escort.  When  the  train 
arrived  at  Moscow  a  street  demonstration  was  taking  place  and 
Khrustalev  again  managed  to  escape.  Here  he  helped  to 
organise  a  Council  of  Labour  Deputies,  and  when  the  great 
general  strike  of  October  began  he  was  sent  as  a  delegate  of  this 
council  to  St.  Petersburg  to  aid  in  organising  a  similar  body 
there.  He  was  successful,  and  after  the  great  strike  became 
the  central  figure  of  the  revolutionary  movement.  He  was 
again  arrested  and  again  exiled,  but  managed  to  make  his 
escape.  The  conduct  of  his  organisation  and  his  opinions  showed 
sufficient  force  and  originality  to  interest  the  world  at  that  time ; 
and  to  this  day,  of  course,  he  continues  one  of  the  leaders  of 
the  movement 

Another  leader,  Trotsky,  likewise  a  young  man  in  the  early 


366  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

thirties,  is  equally  known  among  the  revolutionists.  In  a  re- 
cent talk  with  the  latter  I  asked  what  was  the  final  conclusion 
reached  by  the  leaders  of  this  movement  as  to  the  future  of  the 
revolution,  and  he  answered  that  the  future  army  would  have  to 
be  educated  for  revolt  in  the  villages  themselves.  In  four 
years  the  army  will  be  entirely  composed  of  new  recruits.  It 
is  hoped  by  Trotsky,  as  well  as  by  a  large  part  of  the  peasantry 
themselves,  that  the  new  army,  made  up  of  young  men  familiar 
with  existing  conditions,  will  be  made  up  of  revolutionists. 

In  the  new  revolutionary  tactics  which  are  working  toward 
a  complete  unity  of  the  peasants  and  working  people  in  the  revo- 
lutionary movement,  the  popular  faction  of  the  Social  Demo- 
cratic party  has  played  a  still  more  important  role  perhaps 
than  the  Council  of  Labour  Deputies.  But  there  has  been  a 
certain  current  of  opinion  in  the  party  against  this  evidently 
practical  and  indispensable  proposal  of  unity.  The  minority 
faction,  represented  by  a  number  of  leaders,  among  others  by 
Zeretelly,  has  a  very  great  scorn  for  peasant  rebellions,  which 
it  claims  have  always  been  easily  suppressed.  It  might,  of 
course,  be  answered  that  rebellions  conducted  by  workingmen 
alone  have  likewise  failed.  Fortunately,  this  attitude  of  sus- 
picion toward  the  peasantry  and  underestimate  of  their  power 
in  the  popular  movement  are  confined  almost  entirely  to  the 
leaders.  The  majority  faction  and  the  Council  of  Labour 
Deputies,  both  composed  largely  of  workingmen,  have  evolved 
no  such  theory  of  the  superiority  of  workingmen  over  all  other 
classes,  either  during  the  revolutionary  movement  or  after  it. 
The  workingmen  have  from  the  first  shown  themselves  more 
social  than  the  majority  of  the  professional  Socialists,  especially 
in  their  attitude  toward  the  peasant  class. 

Nevertheless,  the  attitude  of  these  leaders  of  the  Social  Dem- 
ocratic Party,  more  workingman  than  the  workingmen  them- 
selves, more  proletarian  than  the  proletarians,  has  been  a 
great  retarding  force  on  the  revolutionary  movement,  and  one 
of  the  great  changes  through  which  the  masses  of  the  people 
have  gone  has  been  to  learn  to  distrust  those  who  believe, that 
there  is  a  fundamental  antagonism  between  the  two  most  im- 
portant classes  of  the  country,  the  peasants  and  the  working 
people.     It  was  because  of  this  suspicion  toward  the  peasantry 


THE  POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN  367 

that  the  leaders  of  the  minority  succeeded  in  getting  the  last 
congress  of  the  party  to  reject  guerilla  warfare  and  the  ex- 
propriation of  Governmental  funds  as  a  means  of  combat  at  the 
present  moment.  The  resolution,  however,  would  have  been 
lost  had  it  been  put  to  the  vote  of  the  Russians  of  the  party 
alone.  The  delegates  from  Poland,  the  Baltic  Provinces,  and  the 
Caucasus,  though  most  revolutionary,  were  against  the  practice 
of  guerilla  war  at  the  present  time  for  a  very  practical  reason 
peculiar  to  these  non-Russian  provinces  —  that  the  guerilla 
war  in  these  sections  has  necessarily  taken  an  anti-Russian 
turn,  and  the  Russian  soldiers  stationed  as  garrison  there  have 
been  severe  sufferers.  Many  lives  of  innocent  peasant  soldiers 
have  thus  been  sacrificed,  and  sometimes  it  has  happened  that 
Russian  revolutionists  themselves  have  been  killed  through 
inevitable  mistakes.  This  reason  does  not  apply  in  Russia 
itself,  and  the  overwhelming  majority  of  the  working  people  of 
Russia,  even  of  those  who  are  members  of  this  party,  favours 
relentless  warfare  against  the  Government  and  the  expropria- 
tion of  Government  money. 

It  can  be  asserted  with  all  confidence  that  the  Lettish,  Polish, 
and  Caucasian  leaders  of  the  party  are  not  of  a  moderate  but 
of  the  most  revolutionary  opinion.  A  Lettish  leader  has 
assured  me  that  his  party  is  only  temporarily  against  guerilla 
war  because  the  Russian  movement  itself  is  scarcely  ripe  for 
these  tactics.  A  leader  of  the  Poles  has  pointed  out  that  a 
solution  of  the  difficulty  has  been  found  by  one  of  the  chief 
Polish  Socialist  parties.  This  organisation  has  declared  itself 
in  favor  of  guerilla  war,  but  at  the  same  time  against  all  war 
on  the  Russian  soldiers.  This  restricts  guerilla  tactics  very 
narrowly,  but  the  principle  is  that  in  which  the  large  majority 
of  the  Russian  working  people  and  nationalists  undoubtedly 
believe.  The  most  important  Caucasian  leader,  though  a  mem- 
ber of  the  minority  faction,  declared  to  me  that  the  peasants 
of  the  Caucasus  are  both  revolutionary  and  well  armed,  that 
they  make  use  of  the  strike  and  boycott  almost  as  frequently 
and  as  successfully  as  the  workingmen,  that  they  are  largely 
members  of  the  party,  and  that  the  party  hopes  to  keep  them 
in  its  ranks,  even  those  who  are  property  owners.  Certainly 
these  peasants  are  not  opposed  generally  to  guerilla  war. 


368  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

The  abandonment  of  guerilla  war  means  the  crippling  of  the 
agitation  in  the  army  itself.  All  the  conferences  of  those 
who  have  risked  their  lives  in  this  work  favour  both  guerilla 
war  and  the  expropriation  of  Government  money.  In  the 
resolutions  introduced  by  the  majority  faction,  both  these  meas- 
ures are  favoured  as  a  means  of  preparing  the  members  of  the 
party  and  the  working  people  in  general  for  future  revolutionary 
conflicts.  This  is  naturally  the  principal  question  within  the 
party,  for,  if  the  organisation  goes  in  for  a  guerilla  civil  war, 
it  must  expect  to  receive  the  most  bitter  opposition  of  all  well- 
to-do  and  prosperous  classes,  who  will  necessarily  suffer  by  the 
resulting  confusion,  and  it  must  at  the  same  time  seek  the  closest 
possible  alliance  with  the  peasantry.  The  leaders  of  the 
majority  now  in  control  of  the  party  clearly  recognise  this 
significance  of  the  new  policy.  It  is  for  this  reason  that  they 
are  in  favour  not  merely  of  guerilla  war  but  of  the  organisation 
of  armed  bands  composed  partly  or  altogether  of  non-party 
members,  thus  offering  the  possibility  of  the  most  complete  co- 
operation with  the  peasants,  who  have  shown  very  little  tendency 
to  join  the  Social  Democratic  organisation.  The  majority 
faction  realises  thoroughly  the  necessity  of  a  full  unity  in  the 
revolutionary  movement  and  points  out  that  the  lack  of  this 
has  been  the  chief  failure  up  to  the  present  point. 

The  leaders  now  in  control  of  the  party  feel  that  the  peas- 
antry and  the  less  well-to-do  element  of  the  middle  classes  of  the 
large  cities  are  entirely  against  both  the  landlords  and  the  abso- 
lutism and  altogether  ripe  for  a  thorough  democratic  revolution. 
This  is  why  they  favour  the  fullest  cooperation  both  with  the 
peasants  and  with  the  majority  of  the  middle  classes  of  the 
towns.  But  even  these  leaders  do  not  concede  that  the  Socialism 
of  either  of  these  classes  can  possibly  be  as  genuine  on  the 
whole  as  that  of  the  working  people ;  they  do  not  feel  that  unity 
is  possible  on  the  great  land  question,  the  first  social  issue  to 
be  solved  by  a  democratic  government.  But  they  do  feel  that 
these  classes  can  all  struggle  side  by  side  for  a  constitutional 
assembly.  It  seems,  then,  that  this  party  under  the  present 
leadership  has  shown  that  it  may  assume  a  part,  but  not  the 
whole,  of  the  leadership  of  the  revolutionary  movement. 

I  talked  with  the  chief  speaker  and  also  with  the  chief  writer 


THE  POSITION  OF  THE  WORKINGMEN  369 

of  this  party  in  their  separate  hiding  places  in  the  woods  of 
Finland.     Alexinsky,   one  of  the  chief  figures  in  the  second 
Duma,  is  part  workingman,  part  student,  very  much  in  the  same 
way  as  Khrustalev.     When  he  was  elected  to  the  Duma  he  was 
member  of  the  Central  Committee  of  the  party  in  St.  Petersburg. 
He  is  also  a  very  young  man,  scarcely  above  thirty  years  of  age. 
Like  all  the  present  leaders  of  the  party,  he  feels  that  it  must 
struggle  as  much  against  the  "traitor  Constitutional  Democrats " 
as  against  the  Government  itself,  and  he  stakes  all  his  hope  in 
the  future  of  the  revolution  on  the  further  development  of  the 
peasants*  movement.     He  thought  that  the  power  given  to  the 
landlords  in  the  third  Duma  was  a  reactionary  movement  that 
would  especially  stir  up  the  peasants'  hatred.     Before  this,  he 
said,  the  landlords  were  only  parasites,  now  they  are  occupying 
themselves  with  the  politics  of  oppression  as  much  as  their  noble 
heads  permit.     He  felt  that  it  was  only  when  the  peasants  were 
in  a  revolutionary  movement  that  it   would   be    possible   to 
secure  the  aid  of   the   army,    and   so  he,    it   is    seen,    was   in 
substantial  agreement  with  the  organisers  of  the   Councils  of 
Labour  Deputies. 

Still  more  important  for  understanding  the  position  of  the 
workingmen's  party  at  the  present  moment  was  my  talk  with 
the  man  who  is  perhaps  the  most  popular  leader  in  Russia, 
Lenin.  He  feels  that  the  revolution  in  Russia  is  being  re- 
tarded consciously  by  foreign  capitalists  and  governments, 
which  are  very  glad  to  be  able  to  hold  it  back  at  any  cost, 
knowing  that  it  is  sure  to  have  a  social  character  in  the  end 
that  will  affect  even  their  own  governments.  All  of  his  views 
are  formed  with  a  very  full  knowledge  of  the  economic  and 
political  situation  of  other  countries  and  are  especially  interest- 
ing because  he  sharply  differentiates  his  Socialism  from  that 
prevailing  in  Germany,  whence  the  leaders  of  the  opposite 
faction  have  taken  bodily  nearly  all  their  ideas.  The  German 
movement,  he  finds,  has  been  too  anxious  to  be  legal.  Under 
a  despotic  government  like  that  of  Prussia  he  would  have  been 
glad  to  see  it  take  a  more  illegal  and  violent  form;  he  thought 
that  it  had  been  deluded  by  the  fact  that  Prussia  had  a  paper 
constitution. 

Like  Alexinsky,  Lenin  awaits  the  agrarian  movement,  favours 


37©  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  guerilla  war  at  the  present  time,  and  hopes  that  a  railway 
strike  with  the  destruction  of  the  lines  of  communication  and 
the  support  of  the  peasantry  may  some  day  put  the  Government 
of  Russia  into  the  people's  hands.  However,  I  was  shocked 
to  find  that  this  important  leader  also,  though  he  expects  a  full 
cooperation  with  the  peasants  on  equal  terms  during  the 
revolution,  feels  toward  them  a  very  deep  distrust,  thinking 
them  to  a  large  extent  bigoted  and  blindly  patriotic,  and 
fearing  that  they  may  some  day  shoot  down  the  revolutionary 
workingmen  as  the  French  peasants  did  during  the  Paris 
Commune. 

The  chief  basis  for  this  distrust  is  of  course  the  prejudiced 
feeling  that  the  peasants  are  not  likely  to  become  good  So- 
cialists. It  is  on  account  of  this  feeling  that  Lenin  and  all 
the  Social  Democratic  leaders  place  their  hopes  on  a  future 
development  of  modem  large  agricultural  estates  in  Russia  and 
the  increase  of  the  landless  agricultural  working  class,  which 
alone  they  believe  would  prove  truly  Socialist.  .  At  the  same 
time  Lenin  is  far  more  open-minded  on  the  subject  than  the 
leaders  formerly  in  control  of  the  party,  and  conceded  it  was 
possible  that  such  peasants  or  farmers  as  were  not  at  the  same 
time  employers  might  join  in  a  future  Socialist  movement. 

We  see,  then,  that  the  Russian  working  people  in  all  their 
organisations  are  prepared  for  a  cordial  and  full  cooperation 
with  the  agricultural  population  in  the  revolutionary  movement, 
but  we  see  at  the  same  time  that  their  leading  political  party 
expects  the  city  working  people  to  maintain  the  chief  r6le  and 
that  the  confidence  of  the  leaders  of  this  party  in  the  peasantry 
is  without  any  deep  roots.  There  is  another  Socialist  and  revo- 
lutionary organisation  in  Russia,  however,  that  has  as  much 
trust  in  the  peasants  as  in  the  workingmen,  an  organisation 
that  has  also  a  very  large  following  among  the  working  classes. 
It  is  to  this  revolutionary  body  that  we  must  look  to  find  out 
how  far  the  movement  for  the  unifying  of  the  various  revolu- 
tionary tendencies,  for  the  formation  of  a  single  national  revo- 
lutionary movement,  has  progressed. 


CHAPTER  III 

ORGANISING 

THE  principles  and  tactics  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionary- 
Party  afford  the  best  insight  into  the  heart  of  the  whole 
revolutionary  and  Socialist  movement  that  is  taking  possession 
of  the  greater  part  of  Russia's  peasants  and  workingmen.  Like 
the  majority  of  the  peasants  and  workingmen,  the  party  is  not 
looking  backward  on  recent  defeats  and  victories  as  marking 
any  final  stage  in  the  movement ;  there  is  no  sign  of  surrender 
or  compromise.  A  recent  party  statement  claims  that  the 
revolution  has  scarcely  seen  the  end  of  its  first  act ;  that  the  chief 
characters  in  this  first  act  were  the  city  workingmen  —  the 
advance  guard  of  the  revolution  —  but  that  it  would  be  erro- 
neous to  believe  that  this  advance  guard  can  take  the  place 
of  the  bulk  of  the  army,  the  peasantry.  It  is  just  at  this  point 
that  the  party  differs  from  the  Social  Democratic  organisation 
which  looks  to  the  peasants  to  play  a  secondary,  if  essential,  rdle. 
"We  are  only  at  the  beginning  of  the  revolution,"  says 
this  declaration,  "and  we  have  before  us  a  long  period  of  obsti- 
nate struggle,  of  organization,  of  new  open  conflicts,  of  new 
defeats  and  new  victories."  The  Government,  it  acknowledges, 
is  again  in  full  power,  but  the  general  atmosphere  is  no  longer 
the  same  and  no  repression  in  the  world  can  efface  from  the 
conscience  of  the  people  what  it  has  felt  and  endured  dur- 
ing the  period  through  which  it  has  just  passed.  The  task  is 
the  same  as  before  the  Manifesto,  but  the  conditions  are  more 
favourable.  In  a  conversation  with  one  of  the  younger,  but 
most  important  leaders,  of  the  party,  Sevenkov,  the  man  who 
planned  the  "executions"  of  the  brutal  von  Plehve  and  the 
Grand  Duke  Sergius,  I  found  he  held  the  same  view.  Far  from 
underestimating  the  obstacles  ahead  of  the  movement,  Sevenkov 
felt  that  the  difficulties  of  the  French  Revolution  were  a  baga- 
telle by  comparison.     The  executive  committee  of  the  party 

371 


372  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

feels  the  same  way:  it  looks  at  the  third  Duma  as  having  the 
power  of  considerably  strengthening  the  Autocracy;  it  does 
not  deny  that  certain  elements  of  the  population,  frightened 
by  the  growing  profundity  of  the  revolution,  its  development 
from  a  purely  political  to  a  profoundly  social  movement, 
have  been  driven  into  the  camp  of  the  enemy ;  it  acknowledges 
that  a  part  of  the  educated  leaders  of  the  revolutionary  move- 
ment have  become  tired  out,  that  another  part  have  become 
disappointed,  and  that  a  third  part  have  lost  their  heads ;  it  sees 
that  the  Government  repression  has  successfully  prevented  the 
organised  movement  of  the  masses,  and  it  recognises  that  active 
and  rebellious  individuals,  finding  no  possibility  of  an  organ- 
ised outlet  for  their  passionate  anger  against  the  Government, 
have  taken  to  individual  actions  which  have  no  social  value, 
however  much  they  may  have  been  prompted  in  the  first 
instance  by  the  social  spirit.  Nevertheless,  it  feels  that  this 
very  situation  will  still  further  intensify  the  struggle  and  will 
weld  all  the  revolutionary  movements  into  a  single  whole. 

Viewing  the  situation  thus  seriously,  but  without  the  least 
despondency,  the  party  with  its  powerful  allies,  the  Rail- 
way Union,  the  Peasants'  Union  and  the  majority  of  the  Social 
Democratic  Party,  has  laid  out  a  whole  plan  of  campaign  against 
the  Autocracy  to  be  carried  out  without  regard  to  the  length  of 
time  or  number  of  lives  necessary  for  its  execution.  The  party 
especially  urges  the  peasantry  to  concentrate  their  efforts  against 
the  Government  and  its  agents  rather  than  against  the  land- 
lords, and  has  a  highly  elaborate  series  of  suggestions  of  means 
by  which  the  struggle  can  be  carried  on  with  the  greatest 
possible  effect.  The  party  undertakes  to  direct  into  a  common 
plan  of  action  the  innumerable  devoted  persons  who  propose  to 
sell  their  lives  for  those  of  officials  who  are  carrying  out  the 
Czar's  plan  of  murder  on  the  wholesale  scale.  These  persons 
are  advised  by  the  party  as  to  the  means  of  organizing  their 
actions,  of  bringing  them  as  far  as  possible  into  a  general  plan, 
of  making  them  simultaneous,  of  directing  them  against  the 
most  nefarious  persons,  of  aiding  them  to  reach  a  successful 
result,  and,  in  such  few  cases  where  this  is  possible,  to  escape 
with  their  own  lives.  The  party  also  is  always  busy  with  plans 
for  all  possible  insurrectionary  and  revolutionary  movements 


ORGANISING  373 

on  a  national  scale  that  seem  to  have  any  chance  of  success; 
above  all,  it  concentrates  its  attention  on  the  army  and  navy, 
and  as  far  as  possible  on  the  officers,  feeling  that  intelligent 
organisation  is  most  of  all  necessary  in  an  army  movement. 
To  the  workingmen  the  party  says  above  all  that  the  labour 
unions  must  enter,  independently  of  all  political  parties,  into 
Socialist  and  revolutionary  politics. 

In  order  to  promote  the  unification  of  all  the  elements  of  the 
population  that  recognise  that  the  only  way  to  answer  the 
war  the  Government  is  levying  against  the  Russian  people, 
is  for  the  people  to  levy  war  against  the  Government,  the 
party  is  endeavouring  to  maintain  the  friendliest  relations 
with  all  organisations  that  are  ready  to  fight.  It  has  been 
especially  ready  and  willing  to  grant  whatever  national  autono- 
my is  demanded  by  the  movements  of  the  very  many  oppressed 
people  that  live  under  the  Czar's  rule.  By  this  policy  it 
has  brought  into  intimate  relations  with  itself  the  principal 
revolutionary  party  in  Poland  and  also  the  principal  Armenian 
organisation. 

This  important  organisation  has  conceived  a  broad  idea 
not  only  with  regard  to  tactics;  its  principles  also  are  so  broad 
as  to  admit  all  the  important  revolutionary  elements  in 
the  country.  The  preamble  to  the  party  programme,  besides 
employing  the  usual  Marxian  formulas,  broadly  attributes 
social  progress  to  the  conscious  action  of  those  who  struggle 
for  truth  and  justice ;  while  the  party  expects  to  use,  in  order  to 
realise  its  end  of  revolutionary  Socialism,  all  the  positive 
elements  of  economic  evolution  in  the  capitalist  regime  and  also 
independent  and  autonomous  creative  powers  of  the  working 
classes,  whether  property  less  or  not.  Thus  the  party  appeals 
not  only  to  the  industrial  working  classes,  but  to  the  small 
farmers  and  to  the  professional  element,  without  regard  to  the 
question  as  to  whether  they  are  well-to-do  or  not.  The  language 
of  its  programme,  as  that  of  many  of  its  leaders,  suggests  that 
its  attack  is  levelled  against  capitalism  rather  than  against 
private  property,  this  is  partly  why  it  has  had  considerable 
success  in  bringing  about  a  unity  among  all  the  revolutionary 
classes  of  Russia. 

The  party  assumes  that  war  exists  between  the   Russian 


374  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Government  and  the  Russian  people.  It  assumes  that  this  war 
ought  to  be  conducted  under  the  rules  of  civilised  warfare,  and 
it  strictly  limits  and  disciplines  the  action  of  its  party  mem- 
bers to  such  a  degree  that  the  moderate  parties  recognise 
that  it  lives  up  to  its  own  code,  which  can  by  no  means  be 
said  of  the  Russian  Government.  The  party  saw  at  once  that  in 
this  war  against  odds  more  overwhelming  perhaps  than  those  of 
any  war  on  record,  new  methods  and  new  tactics  are  necessary, 
but  it  believes  that  the  measures  that  it  undertakes  are  an 
inevitable  outcome  of  the  mere  fact  that  this  civil  and  social 
war  exists. 

Already  there  is  a  roll  of  thirty  thousand  people  killed  in 
the  struggle  for  freedom  —  the  majority  in  massacres  in  which 
the  police  and  Cossacks  have  participated.  Not  only  the 
outlying  and  non-Russian  provinces,  like  Poland,  the  Caucasus, 
and  the  Baltic  Provinces,  are  involved,  but  every  part  of  Russia 
without  exception.  At  the  present  time  all  but  26  of  the  661 
districts  of  European  Russia  are  either  under  some  form  of  mar- 
tial law  or  the  local  governor  is  given  by  Nicholas  II.  the  right 
to  issue  any  order  he  pleases  with  the  force  of  law. 

A  glance  at  a  few  places  where  the  conflicts  have  been  most 
acute  will  help  to  show  how  far  this  war  has  gone.  In  several 
Russian  cities,  like  Odessa  and  Bielostock,  several  per  cent.- 
of  the  population  have  been  killed  or  wounded.  In  Odessa 
as  well  as  in  Warsaw  and  Lodz,  tens  of  thousands  of  persons 
have  been  imprisoned  and  exiled.  The  condition  is  such  that 
scarcely  one  family  out  of  ten  has  not  suffered  through  its  own 
members  or  intimate  connections.-  Many  other  places  have 
suffered  more  severely:  Rostov  and  Novorissisk  on  the  Black 
Sea,  Tomsk  in  Siberia,  and  Kronstadt  a  couple  of  hours  from 
St.  Petersburg,  have  been  partly  depopulated. 

This  is  war  of  the  most  barbarous  kind;  and  without  at- 
tempting to  judge  the  morality  or  practicability  of  the  meas- 
ures adopted  in  their  counter- war  by  the  revolutionists,  I 
have  no  hesitancy  in  saying  that  they  are  justified  in  using 
any  means  that  tend  to  reach  their  goal  without  damaging 
innocent  persons.  Archangelsky  declared  in  the  Duma  that  as 
long  as  the  demands  of  the  people  with  regard  to  the  pardon 
of  the  hundreds  and  thousands  of  political  prisoners,  and  the 


ORGANISING  375 

abolition  of  martial  law,  were  denied,  as  long  as  the  Govern- 
ment refused  to  abdicate  in  favour  of  a  constitutional  assembly- 
elected  by  the  equal  votes  of  the  whole  people,  the  war  would 
continue. 

The  character  of  the  war  waged  by  the  revolutionists  is 
rapidly  changing.  During  the  year  1907  the  war  was  reduced 
almost  exclusively  to  the  executions  of  exceptionally  brutal 
officials  as  a  check  on  the  ruthless  massacres  and  "legal" 
murders  practised  by  the  Government.  Widespread  prev- 
alence of  this  kind  of  warfare,  it  will  be  readily  seen,  is  almost 
an  inevitable  result  of  Russia's  condition.  This  is  recognised 
by  moderates  as  well  as  by  all  the  popular  parties;  by  the 
moderates  when  they  refuse  to  condemn  these  acts,  except 
in  stating  at  the  same  time  that  they  are  the  natural  accom- 
paniment of  the  violent  acts  of  the  Government ;  by  the  popular 
parties  in  refusing  to  condemn  them  altogether,  except  oc- 
casionally on  purely  tactical  grounds.  The  execution  of  officials 
is  justified  as  the  only  possible  check  to  the  savagery  and 
cruelty  of  the  official  class.  It  is  not  supposed  that  such 
measures  will  long  continue  and  it  is  purposed  even  by  the  most 
extreme  organisations  to  replace  them  at  the  earliest  moment 
by  an  entirely  different  mode  of  warfare. 

When  Ministers  Sipiaguine  and  von  Plehve  were  killed,  a 
majority  of  the  Russian  people  applauded,  and  a  large  part 
of  Europe  has  since  learned  to  recognise  that  these  acts  were  as 
patriotic  as  that  of  William  Tell.  The  killing  of  Bobrikov  is 
certainly  approved  by  the  majority  of  the  peaceful  people  of 
Finland,  and  like  the  execution  of  von  Plehve  brought  decidedly 
beneficial  results,  since  no  man  so  strong  and  ruthless  was  to 
be  procured  to  succeed  him.  Of  those  since  executed,  Ignatiev, 
a  favourite  of  the  Czar,  was  the  chief  instigator  of  the  massacres 
of  thousands  of  Jews;  von  Launitz  was  the  savage  head  of 
Russia's  savage  police;  Pavlov,  who  while  speaking  to  the  first 
Duma  from  the  Minister's  bench  was  driven  out  of  the  room 
with  calls  of  "murderer,"  was  the  first  organiser  of  the  lawless 
military  courts  that  have  executed  hundreds  of  persons  with- 
out any  real  trial;  Maximovsky,  as  head  of  the  prison  system, 
was  responsible  for  the  wholesale  tortures  and  murders  of  poli- 
tical prisoners;  and  the  Grand  Duke  Sergius  was  perhaps  the 


376  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

most  cruel,  brutal,  and  corrupt  member  of  the  royal  family 
since  Ivan  the  Terrible.  It  is  impossible  to  deny  that  the 
nation  has  gained  tremendously  by  the  death  of  each  of  these 
individuals,  and  relatively  few  Russians  outside  of  Govern- 
ment circles  are  disposed  to  question  the  public  utility  of 
most  of  these  executions.  Although,  as  the  executions  spread 
from  the  highest  authorities  to  lower  officials,  their  social  utility 
becomes  more  and  more  questionable  —  laying  aside  for  the 
moment  all  questions  of  morality  inapplicable  to  a  state  of 
war,  and  remembering  only  the  deep  human  instinct  against 
all  unnecessary  cruelty  and  unnecessary  sacrifices  of  life  —  we 
cannot  doubt  that  such  of  them  as  are  justified  by  the  national 
conscience  have  afforded  much  temporary  relief  from  the  hor- 
rible  practices   of  the   Government. 

The  revolutionists  and  other  outraged  citizens  have  killed 
and  wounded  in  the  two  years  before  July  i,  1907,  seven  hun- 
dred police  officials  and  several  thousand  spies,  political  police, 
and  other  persons  engaged  in  similar  work.  The  proportion 
of  the  police  officials  attacked  has  been  a  considerable  part  of 
the  total,  but  there  can  be  no  question  that  nearly  all  such  offi- 
cials are  engaged  in  a  perfectly  relentless  war  against  those 
who  are  trying  to.  overturn  the  Government.  Nor  is  the  pro- 
portion of  the  total  number  of  common  police  and  gendarmes 
killed  or  injured  a  small  one,  although  the  policy  of  all  the 
parties  is  to  attack  such  persons  as  little  as  possible,  since  it  is 
recognised  that  they  are  mere  mercenaries,  selling  themselves 
perhaps  only  temporarily  for  their  bloody  work. 

A  large  part  of  the  common  soldiers  as  well  as  Cossacks 
have  been  used  against  the  revolutionists,  yet  even  when 
both  are  classed  together  only  a  few  hundreds  out  of  the  army 
of  nearly  two  million  have  been  killed  or  injured,  for  the 
revolutionists  hope  to  ultimately  win  over  most  of  the  soldiers 
and  even  a  considerable  part  of  the  Cossacks.  Unfortunately, 
a  good  many  private  citizens  have  also  been  killed  or  wounded 
for  political  causes  by  peasants  or  workingmen,  but  the  total 
out  of  Russia's  millions  is  only  a  few  hundred;  not  at  all  a  seri- 
ous matter  in  these  times  of  tremendous  losses  of  life. 

Moreover,  it  is  only  in  a  very  few  parts  of  the  country  that 
these  acts  of  violence   have  gone   to   a  bitter  extreme.     In 


ORGANISING  377 

Sebastopol  and  Kronstadt,  two  small  towns  of  a  half  a  hundred 
thousand  people,  over  a  hundred  officials  have  been  killed  or 
wounded  as  the  result  of  the  repeated  mutinies  of  soldiers  and 
sailors  engaged  in  a  desperate  war  with  the  authorities.  In  the 
Caucasus,  also  in  Tiflis  and  Baku,  hundreds  of  these  attacks  on 
officials  have  taken  place  and  the  ordinary  life  of  the  community 
has  certainly  been  forced  into  an  entirely  new  course.  The 
same  is  true  of  all  the  chief  cities  of  Poland.  Outside  of  these 
districts  there  have  been  massacres,  mutinies,  and  other  serious 
forms  of  revolutionary  disturbances,  but  the  attacks  on  offi- 
cials have  never  reached  such  an  acute  stage  as  to  mean  any- 
thing in  the  daily  life  of  the  ordinary  citizen. 

This  method  of  warfare  is  pretty  well  under  the  control  of 
its  principal  advocates,  the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party. 
During  the  first  Duma  the  party  ordered  that  the  executions 
should  cease,  and  they  fell  to  less  than  one  half  of  what  they 
were  before,  such  attacks  as  were  made  being  those  of  half- 
organised  groups  or  individuals  on  the  police. 

Recognising  the  inevitability  of  this  form  of  self-defence  on 
the  part  of  the  population,  neither  of  the  first  two  Dumas  were 
willing  to  condemn  it,  without  attacking  in  the  same  breath 
the  Government  also.  The  representatives  of  the  people  in 
both  bodies,  the  deputies  of  95  per  cent,  of  the  Russian  popu- 
lation, the  peasants  and  workingmen,  were  unwilling  even 
to  characterise  with  similar  expressions  the  violence  of  the 
Government  and  that  of  the  popular  revolutionary  organisa- 
tions, for  the  latter  they  recognise  as  a  legitimate  means  of 
replying  to  the  warfare  of  a  government.  Even  the  moderates, 
in  condemning  violence  on  both  sides,  put  the  chief  blame 
on  the  Government;  assuming  that  this  violence  will  and  must 
continue  until  liberty  is  granted  to  the  people,  they  do  not 
defend  it,  but  accept  it,  once  and  for  all,  as  the  inevitable  result 
of  the  Government's  own  action,  and  hope  that  one  day  the 
Czar,  realising  his  inability  to  restore  order,  will  turn  over  his 
power  into  their  hands. 

Those  of  the  popular  parties  which  do  not  themselves  take 
part  in  the  practice  of  these  executions,  defend  them.  Alexin- 
sky,  the  Social  Democratic  leader  in  the  second  Duma,  pro- 
claimed that  these  executions  were  as  legitimate  a  weapon  of 


378  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

warfare  as  the  courts-martial  of  the  Government.  "The 
State,"  he  said,  "is  a  gallows  State,  a  nagaika  State,  a  State 
of  murder."  Even  the  leaders  of  the  more  moderate  faction  of 
this  party  have  confessed  to  me  in  private  conversation  that 
they  recognise  the  utility  of  popular  executions  and  wish  to 
see  them  increased,  desiring  especially  at  the  present  time  the 
execution  of  Stolypine,  a  strong  and  brutal  servant  the  Czar 
would  find  it  very  difficult  to  replace. 

The  first  of  the  present  series  of  great  executions  was  not 
accomplished  by  a  member  of  any  party.  The  Minister  of  the. 
Interior,  Sipiaguine,  was  shot  by  Balmachov  in  April,  1902. 
**  My  only  accomplice  in  this  act,"  said  the  popular  executioner, 
before  paying  its  penalty,  "was  the  Russian  Government;  I 
was  always  against  terrorism  and  violence,  I  was  in  favour  of 
law  and  the  constitution ;  it  was  the  Russian  ministers  who  con- 
verted me  to  the  belief  that  there  is  no  order  and  law  in  Russia, 
but  instead  only  unpunished  lawlessness  and  violence  that  can 
be  resisted  only  by  force." 

The  Social  Revolutionary  Party  has  been  responsible  for 
all  the  important  later  deeds.  Since  it  has  undertaken  to  or- 
ganise this  kind  of  warfare,  it  is  natural  that  individuals  who 
have  decided  that  the  nation  has  had  enough  of  some  partic- 
ular oppressor,  should  join  their  forces  with  this  organisation 
for  the  purpose  of  carrying  out  their  proposed  act.  One- 
quarter  of  the  persons  executed  by  the  Government  in  the  first 
year  of  the  courts-martial  were  members  of  this  party.  Al- 
ready over  a  year  ago  (April,  1907)  the  party  had  lost  fifteen 
thousand  of  its  members,  more  than  one-quarter  of  its 
total  membership,  by  imprisonment,  or  exile  in  Siberia  or  in 
the  mines;  there  can  be  little  question  that  at  least  one-half  of 
this  organisation  has  been  now  captured  by  the  enemy.  But 
the  party  is  by  no  means  destroyed;  the  fighting  spirit  of  the 
remaining  members  is  rather  intensified,  and  new  recruits 
supply  the  empty  places  in  the  ranks.  Each  martyrdom  brings 
in  numerous  new  persons.  If  we  can  judge  by  the  case  of  the 
revolutionists  released  from  imprisonment  or  exile  of  fifteen 
or  twenty  years  by  the  amnesty  of  the  Government  in  1905, 
we  can  be  assured  that  as  often  as  those  now  imprisoned  or 
exiled  are  released  or  make  escape,  they  also  will  rejoin  the 


ORGANISING  379 

movement.  All  the  world  knows  of  the  cases  of  exiles,  both 
men  and  women,  some  of  them  in  the  later  years  of  life,  and  of 
prisoners  who  have  been  locked  up  in  the  fortresses  ever  since 
the  former  revolutionary  movement  in  the  eighties,  who  on  their 
escape  or  release  have  plunged  at  once  into  the  war  of  the  new 
generation. 

But  the  warfare  is  fast  moving  out  of  this  stage;  the  revo- 
lutionists are  now  planning  not  isolated  acts  of  "popular 
defence,"  but  to  teach  the  whole  nation  how  to  wage  aggressive 
war  against  the  Government.  For  this  purpose  the  party 
is  trying  to  draw  into  its  camp  all  persons  of  whatever 
nationality  or  social  class  who  are  ready  to  give  up  their  lives 
to  overthrow  the  Czarism,  and  it  has  considered  every  possible 
plan  for  accomplishing  its  purpose.  At  present  it  is  dividing  its 
energies  between  plans  for  a  general  military  and  popular 
insurrection  and  its  efforts  to  teach  the  people  how  to  wage  a 
guerilla  war  on  the  Government,  which  might,  in  the  course  of 
a  few  years,  lead  up  to  this  national  revolutionary  movement. 
A  relatively  small  portion  of  its  energies  now  goes  to  the  exe- 
cution of  officials,  and  the  day  is  certainly  drawing  near  when 
these  executions  will  be  almost  entirely  abandoned.  At  a 
period  when  the  masses  of  the  people  had  already  reached  a 
revolutionary  attitude,  but  did  not  yet  know  how  to  fight 
against  the  Government,  the  party  members  considered  it  neces- 
sary to  give  up  their  lives  in  exchange  for  those  of  the  most 
brutal  of  the  oppressors.  Now  that  the  masses  are  being 
drawn  into  ♦fee  warfare,  a  growing  part  of  the  membership 
considers  it  not  only  a  possibility,  but  also  a  democratic  duty, 
to  leave  the  fighting  largely  in  the  hands  of  the  masses  them- 
selves. Recognising  this  first  principle  of  a  democratic  revolu- 
tionism, the  party  is  on  the  verge  of  a  very  fundamental  change. 
From  the  beginning  its  principles  have  been  those  of  a  revolu- 
tionary democracy.  It  proposed  to  use  violence  only  for 
the  purpose  of  establishing  democracy,  the  rule  of  the  people, 
and  not  for  any  other  element  of  its  programme. 

It  was  in  accordance  with  the  previous  interpretation  of 
its  duties  that  it  should  act  for,  rather  than  through,  the  people, 
that  the  party  had  decided  in  favour  of  the  popular  executions 
carried  out  by  the  party  and  against  the  growing  violence  of 


38o  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  peasants  themselves.  It  boasted  that  in  the  early  peasant 
disturbances  managed  by  the  party  in  Poltava  and  Kharkov 
in  1905,  that  there  was  not  a  single  murder  in  more  than  twenty 
provinces.  But  as  we  have  shown,  the  peasants  are  being 
treated  in  a  manner  which  does  not  allow  them  to  refrain  from 
waging  war  on  their  oppressors.  The  party,  fearing  that  this 
independent  warfare  of  the  peasantry  might  develop  to  excess, 
has  passed  repeated  resolutions  against  it,  but  the  yoimg 
leaders  are  all  now  seeing  that  these  spontaneous  conflicts  can- 
not be  restrained  much  longer.  Already  the  party  is  trying 
to  afford  an  outlet  for  the  peasants'  martial  instincts  in  organis- 
ing guerilla  bands  in  each  village  and  finding  a  proper  work 
for  them  to  do.  It  recommends  that  only  officials  be  attacked, 
and  among  these  only  the  most  cruel.  It  allows  land- 
lords to  be  assaulted  only  when  they  have  taken  an  active  part 
in  the  anti-popular  violence,  in  the  Government  expeditions 
of  murder  and  revenge;  but  as  the  cases  of  such  landlords  are 
very  many,  the  peasants  will  have  enough  to  do  without  in- 
fringing the  party's  principles.  One  step  further  and  the 
principal  revolutionary  party  will  have  placed  its  full  reliance 
on  the  capacity  of  the  people  to  wage  their  own  war  of  liberation, 
attempting  only  to  organise  it,  to  give  it  a  national  character 
and  to  bring  it  to  the  earliest  possible  conclusion. 

This  guerilla  war  does  not  any  longer  require  preparatory 
organising.  .  In  a  half  dozen  parts  of  the  country  it  has  already 
been  developed  into  a  very  high  state  —  in  the  Baltic  Provinces, 
in  the  Caucasus,  in  Siberia,  and  in  the  Ural  Mountains.  Al- 
though the  insurrectionary  disturbances  and  mutinies  in  the 
centre  of  Russia  have  ceased  for  more  than  a  year,  Cossack 
armies  have  not  even  yet  succeeded  in  stamping  out  these 
various  guerilla  movements.  A  few  months  ago  a  whole  com- 
pany of  soldiers  who  had  deserted  were  still  to  be  seen  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood of  Briansk  in  the  heart  of  Russia.  During  a  mutiny  last 
year  in  Kiev  this  company  had  escaped  to  the  woods  and  none 
were  captured  for  months,  until  about  them  a  sort  of  legend 
grew  up  in  the  neighbourhood  and  the  peasant  population^  as- 
cribed to  "the  hundred"  almost  fabulous  achievements.  A 
band  of  half  a  hundred  men  were  able  to  elude  capture  for  many 
months  in  the  Ural  Mountains  and  to  make  innumerable    sue- 


ORGANISING  381 

cessful  attacks  on  Government  property  and  Government 
officials ;  always  polite  to  the  population  and  regardful  of  private 
property,  they  became  exceedingly  popular.  It  was  only  in 
January,  1908,  that  the  leader  Lvov,  who  had  by  this  time 
become  nothing  less  than  a  popular  hero  for  hundreds  of  miles 
around,  was  captured.  All  these  incidents  are  of  the  keenest 
interest  to  all  the  peasantry  and  must  have  given  every  pos- 
sible encouragement  to  those  among  them  that  have  decided 
to  devote  themselves  to  guerilla  war. 


CHAPTER  IV 


PLANNING   THE    WAR 


rilHE  goal  of  all  revolutionary  striving  is  the  army.  No 
A  revolutionary  movement  can  hope  to  accomplish  any- 
thing of  lasting  value  until  the  larger  part  of  the  Czar's  army  is 
turned  against  him.  The  revolutionary  parties  have  assigned 
thousands  of  their  members  to  the  work  of  agitation  among  the 
troops;  many  of  these  are  executed,  imprisoned  or  exiled  every 
month,  but  the  ranks  are  continually  filled  and  the  agitation 
goes  on  almost  undiminished.  All  the  parties  have  very 
numerous  organisations  among  the  troops  of  all  the  garrisons 
and  all  branches  of  the  service.  It  is  only  the  Socialist  Revolu- 
tionary party,  however,  that  has  made  any  progress  in  the 
organisation  of  the  officers.  Before  his  recent  arrest,  Tchai- 
kovsky assured  me  that  there  were  no  less  than  four  hundred  or 
five  hundred  members  of  the  revolutionary  Officers*  Union. 
^  Before  the  nation  can  make  use  of  the  army  for  its  own 
purposes  there  are  three  great  difficulties  to  be  overcome:  first, 
the  number  of  officers  ready  to  give  up  their  lives  for  the  cause 
has  to  be  greatly  increased;  second,  further  inroads  have  to  be 
made  into  the  loyalty  of  the  troops,  of  which  a  very  considerable 
portion  is  still  faithful  to  the  Czar;  third,  the  soldiers  who  are 
already  converted  to  the  revolutionary  cause  have  to  be  taught 
not  only  to  refuse  to  shoot  at  the  people,  but  to  make  war  on 
such  regiments  as  remain  stubbornly  loyal. 

I  shall  show  that  none  of  these  obstacles  are  insuperable. 
Every  year  sees  more  and  more  officers  of  the  highest  rank  and 
greatest  capacity  becoming  bitterly  discontented  with  the  exist- 
ing conditions  in  the  army;  loyal  regiments,  even  among  the 
Cossacks  and  Guards,  have  only  a  year  ago  gone  over  to  the 
revolutionary  movement;  and  the  common  soldiers  of  several 
fortresses  have  shown  that,  being  unwilling  to  wait  for  the  word 
of  command,  they  were  even  too  ready  to  die  for  the  cause. 

2>^^ 


PLANNING  THE  WAR  383 

Intelligent  and  progressive  officers,  even  those  whose  chief 
interest  is  in  arms  and  war,  are  on  the  very  verge  of  deserting 
the  Government,  not  only  on  account  of  its  ruin  of  the  nation 
and  of  the  people  at  large,  but  especially  because  of  its  misuse 
of  the  army,  of  the  waging  of  unjust  and  senseless  wars  and  the 
humiliation  of  both  officers  and  soldiers  through  crushing  and 
unnecessary   defeat. 

I  talked  with  an  officer  of  the  Guards  who  was  at  the  same 
time  a  member  of  the  most  extreme  revolutionary  organisation. 
It  was  difficult  to  meet  him  without  danger  to  himself,  but  by 
taking  great  precautions  I  was  able  to  discuss  at  considerable 
length  the  revolutionary  situation  in  the  Guards'  regiments. 
He  acknowledged  that  at  the  time  of  our  conversation  there 
were  no  other  revolutionary  officers  among  the  Guards,  but  he 
said  this  was  because  it  was  assumed  at  that  time,  a  few  months 
after  the  October  Manifesto,  that  certain  constitutional  guaran- 
tees were  in  existence.  He  said  that  before  the  Manifesto  there 
were  scores  of  officers  organised  and  ready  to  aid  in  overthrow- 
ing the  Government,  and  he  predicted  that  this  would  soon 
be  the  case  again  when  it  was  seen  that  the  constitutional  prom- 
ises were  without  value.  Now  that  the  whole  nation  is  dis- 
illusioned on  this  score,  this  time  has  probably  arrived. 

I  met  other  officers  of  various  grades,  including  four  generals 
of  the  highest  rank.  All  acknowledged  that  the  warfare  of 
the  Government  against  the  people  was  injurious  to  the  army  — 
even  the  Minister  of  War,  it  will  be  remembered,  confessed  as 
much  before  the  whole  Duma.  General  Subbotitch  went  further. 
He  is  the  most  important  military  figure  that  has  joined,  not 
the  revolutionists,  but  the  most  extreme  opposition  party. 
He  was  the  chief  figure  in  the  very  large  group  of  officers  that 
supported  for  several  months  a  remarkable  army  daily,  the 
Soldiers*  Voice.  Day  after  day  for  several  months  this  organ 
appeared  with  the  most  fundamental  and  bitter  criticisms  of 
the  Government's  conduct  of  army  affairs.  The  facts  it  ex- 
posed could  hardly  be  more  injurious  to  the  credit  of  the  Czarism 
than  those  recently  laid  before  the  whole  world  by  the  famous 
trial  of  the  generals  who  conducted  the  Japanese  war.  But 
the  matter  was  of  a  different  character.  It  dealt  with  the  use 
of  the  army  in  the  suppression  of  the  revolutionary  disturbances 


384  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

and  the  resulting  disorganisation,  and  with  internal  politics 
in  general;  no  day  passed  when  some  of  its  declarations  would 
not  have  satisfied  the  most  active  revolutionist. 

The  chief  position  of  this  journal,  so  popular  among  the 
Russian  officers,  was  that  the  army  ought  to  remain  neutral  in 
the  internal  politics  of  the  country.  This  is  as  much  as  to  say 
that  such  disturbances  as  could  not  be  suppressed  by  the  police 
must  be  treated  as  insuppressable.  It  would  follow,  of  course, 
that  the  Government  would  have  to  make  terms  with  the 
revolutionists.  General  Subbotitch,  having  since  been  dismissed 
from  the  army  for  conducting  his  governorship  of  Turkestan 
according  to  these  neutral  ideas,  has  come  out  openly  against 
the  Government,  demanding  a  constitution.  In  a  long  attack 
on  the  whole  policy  of  the  Czar  at  the  present  moment  he  says 
frankly  that  the  internal  warfare  being  waged  by  the  Govern- 
ment against  the  people  must  necessarily  lead  to  the  demorali- 
sation and  embitterment  of  the  army  and  the  destruction  of 
military  discipline.  He  accuses  the  Government  of  unrestrained 
violence,  of  allowing  the  people  to  starve  and  of  driving  them 
to  rage  and  exasperation. 

The  Government  realises  the  seriousness  of  the  army  situa- 
tion. As  a  first  measure  of  protection  it  is  proposed  to  raise 
the  army's  pay.  But  while  the  common  soldiers  have  been  given 
an  extra  twenty  kopecks  (ten  cents)  a  month,  a  little  tea  and 
sugar,  soap  and  towels,  and  an  extra  shirt  each  year,  the  Cos- 
sacks have  been  granted  enormous  subsidies  and  special  pay  for 
every  day  of  service  against  "the  internal  enemy,"  They  are  now 
clamouring  for  a  gift  of  horses  from  the  Government  and  for  a 
shortened  service.  To  make  up  for  their  relatively  shabby 
financial  treatment,  such  common  soldiers  as  have  served  the 
Government  faithfully  against  the  revolutionists  are  being  re- 
warded with  the  decoration  of  St,  Anne,  with  the  decoration 
of  St.  George  with  the  words  "for  courage,"  or  with  a  plain 
medal  with  the  words  "for  zeal."  We  doubt  if  the  common 
soldier  enlightened  by  the  revolutionary  agitation  will  take  such 
trinkets  as  compensation  for  shooting  down  his  relatives  — 
especially  in  view  of  the  handsome  treatment  of  the  Cossack 
regiments. 

But  the  lion's  share  of  the  new  Government's  expenditures 


J 


SOME   OF   THE    MEN    WHO    HAVE    HELPED     ORGANISE     THE     SOCIALIST 
REVOLUTIONARY   PARTY   AMONG    PEASANTS 
On   floor,  right,   Stepniak;   left,  Tchaikovsky.     Seated,  right,  Volkovsky;  left, 

Chisko 


I 


M         DC' 


§    I 

en    ^ 


a. 


.a 


PLANNING  THE  WAR  385 

will  go  to  the  commissioned  and  non-commissioned  officers. 
It  is  especially  by  high  pay  and  pensions  that  the  war  ministry 
has  hoped  to  secure  a  permanent  army  of  100,000  non-com- 
missioned officers,  who  would  make  a  life  work  of  executing  the 
Government's  orders  without  question.  The  increase  of  pay 
demanded  by  the  commissioned  officers  is  so  large  that  the 
Government  has  not  dared  yet  to  put  it  into  execution,  but  the 
bill  will  unquestionably  be  passed  by  the  present  Duma  and 
become  a  law,  January  i,  1909. 

As  the  money  for  all  of  these  expenditures,  so  wasteful  for 
starving  Russia,  must  come  from  Germany  or  France,  it  will  be 
difficult  for  the  Government  to  make  it  out  that  this  extrava- 
gance is  of  a  patriotic  character,  to  develop  an  army  to  be  used 
against  foreign  foes.  It  will  be  easy  for  the  revolutionists  to 
convince  the  peasant  soldiers  that  not  only  are  they  getting  too 
little  of  these  immense  sums  but  that  the  whole  plan  is  only  to 
secure  an  army  for  the  further  oppression  of  the  Russian  people. 

The  Soldiers'  Voice  confessed  repeatedly  the  growing 
bitterness  between  soldiers  and  officers.  One  article  warned  the 
military  authorities  against  converting  the  barracks  into  prisons. 
*' Every  movement  of  the  soldier,"  it  stated,  "is  controlled; 
visits  of  acquaintances  or  friends  are  strictly  forbidden;  the 
soldiers  have  been  forbidden  to  walk  in  the  streets,  to  talk  in 
a  crowd,  to  read  newspapers  or  books.  Even  their  letters  are 
submitted  to  the  officers'  censorship."  The  paper  quoted  a 
soldier's  letter  with  approval,  in  which  the  writer  accused  the 
officers  of  humiliating  the  soldier  at  every  opportunity  and 
displaying  a  malice  that  awoke  in  the  soldier's  heart  the 
profoundest    hatred. 

The  most  significant  of  all  the  military  revolts  was  that 
of  the  Preobrajenski  Guards.  The  famous  Guards  mutinied 
almost  to  the  last  man,  demanding  first  of  all  to  be  better  treated 
by  their  superiors,  to  be  relieved  of  police  duties,  to  be  granted 
the  free  right  to  come  and  go  from  the  barracks  and  to  have 
their  private  correspondence  respected.  Two  others  of  the 
demands  of  this  crack  regiment  were  of  the  most  revolutionary 
character:  that  the  duty  of  saluting  officers  excepting  com- 
manders of  battalions  should  be  abolished,  and  that  political 
opinions  should  be  free  in  the  regiment  and  that  no  one  should  be 


386  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

punished  for  his  convictions.  Under  existing  conditions  this 
latter  reform  would  rapidly  lead  to  the  same  demand  for  neu- 
trality on  the  part  of  the  soldiers  as  is  now  put  forward  by  the 
more  progressive  officers.  The  result  would  be  that  the  Govern- 
ment would  soon  find  itself  in  a  helpless  condition  and  that  the 
army,  appealed  to  both  by  the  revolutionists  and  the  Govern- 
ment, would  take  necessarily  a  constitutional  and  popular  stand- 
point. It  is  impossible  that  this,  the  chief  demand  of  the 
Russian  soldiers,  should  be  granted  by  the  military  authorities. 
It  is  impossible,  on  the  other  hand,  that  the  clamour  for  the 
elementary  liberties  of  the  individual  should  not  continue  to 
grow  in  the  army  as  everywhere  else. 

Fortunately  for  Russia,  the  conditions  of  the  army  have 
not  reached  such  a  point  that  the  army  has  been  roused  to  carry 
out  a  purely  military  revolt  and  so  gotten  into  its  hands  the 
destinies  of  the  nation.  But  I  think  I  have  shown  that  the  dis- 
content has  come  at  least  to  this,  that  the  army  could  not  be 
relied  on  to  take  a  stand  against  any  very  widespread  revolu- 
tionary movement,  and  that  it  would  only  be  a  matter  of  a 
relatively  short  time  when  the  army  would  go  over  to  the 
people's  side.  The  revolutionary  leaders  do  not  expect  more. 
Whether  army  officers  themselves  or  leaders  of  the  peasants, 
they  are  of  the  same  opinion  —  that  the  future  revolt  must 
begin  among  the  peasantry  and  that  it  must  rely  on  the  army 
only  for  assistance  and  not  for  carrying  on  the  principal  work 
of  revolution.  The  reason  for  this,  as  stated  by  the  Officers' 
Union,  is  that  no  one  questions  that  a  considerable  part  of  the 
Cossacks,  police,  gendarmes,  and  non-commissioned  officers, 
will  remain  loyal,  amply  satisfied  with  the  large  financial  re- 
ward the  Government  is  able  to  lavish  upon  them  owing  to  the 
generosity  of  the  capitalists  of  foreign  countries  who  are  so 
freely  supplying  it  with  the  means.  Against  such  mercenaries 
the  revolutionists  are  prepared  ultimately  to  wage  a  relent- 
less war. 

The  mass  of  the  peasants  take  the  same  keen  interest  in 
the  army  as  do  the  most  enlightened  and  educated  of  the  revolu- 
tionary army  officers.  Journeying  among  them  in  the  late 
summer  of  1907,  I  found  that  they  were  everywhere  expecting 
that  the  new  recruits,  sworn  in  the  last  two  years  and  to  be 


PLANNING  THE  WAR  387 

enlisted  in  the  two  years  to  come,  would  prove  loyal,  not  to  the 
Czar,  but  to  the  people.  Many  villages  are  making  the 
recruits  take  an  oath  to  the  nation  against  the  Czar,  and  every- 
where I  found  the  people  looking  forward  to  war.  "What 
kind  of  a  war? "  I  asked.  They  answered,  "A  war  for  the  land; 
a  people's  war  in  which  the  soldiers  will  not  fight  against  the 
peasantry  as  before."  This  people's  war,  the  peasants  under- 
stand as  well  as  do  the  revolutionary  organisations,  must  be 
begun  by  themselves,  and  they  seem  to  be  very  nearly  in  a 
proper  mood  for  this. 

In  the  last  village  I  visited,  in  September,  I  was  photo- 
graphing the  poor  little  houses  when  some  women  came  along 
and  asked  what  I  was  doing.  On  explaining  that  I  was  going  to 
use  the  picture  to  describe  the  village  to  foreigners,  they  shouted 
out  in  a  tone  of  bitter  irony:  **  If  you  go  back  to  St.  Petersburg, 
show  your  pictures  to  the  White  Czar  and  let  him  see  how  we 
live  —  like  dogs."  They  said  that  they  knew  the  Czar  did  not 
care  how  they  lived,  but  that  he  cared  precious  well  for  the 
landlords.  A  few  minutes  later  a  passing  peasant,  noticing 
what  I  was  doing,  said:  "See  what  the  Czar  has  brought  us  to! 
He  helps  the  landlords  when  they  are  in  trouble,  gives  them  jobs 
in  the  army  and  the  Government.  For  us  he  does  nothing. 
The  Czar  is  responsible  for  all  this ;  he  did  away  with  the  Duma 
and  the  liberty  he  had  granted  us."  One  peasant,  when  told 
of  the  dissolution  of  the  second  Duma  and  the  creation  of  a 
landlords'  Duma,  cried  out  before  the  whole  crowd:  "What 
a  crook! "  What  is  interesting  in  these  expressions  is  not  that 
they  were  new,  but  that  they  were  said  openly  before  perfect 
strangers.  Certainly  the  peasants  have  got  a  long  way  from 
the  old  belief  in  the  "God-given  powers  of  the  Czar";  certainly 
they  are  not  troubled  with  any  feeling  of  loyalty  or  duty 
toward  his  Government. 

The  peasants  on  the  whole  seemed  to  prefer  the  Socialist 
Revolutionary  Party  at  the  present  moment  to  all  other  revolu- 
tionary organisations.  They  are  all  friendly  disposed  toward 
the  Peasants*  Union  and  the  Labour  Group,  but  the  former  is 
mainly  an  economic  and  the  latter  mainly  a  political  organi- 
sation, whereas  the  Socialist  Revolutionaries  have  given  more 
study  to  the  question  of  how  to  organise  the  peasants'   war 


388  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

and  to  make  a  successful  revolution  than  all  the  other  parties 
combined.  In  nearly  every  one  of  the  six  hundred  districts  of 
Russia,  they  have  their  members,  or  their  committees,  and  in 
tens  of  thousands  of  villages  they  have  little  groups  of  ad- 
herents, I  have  shown  how  they  are  urging  the  full  exercises  of 
its  great  powers  by  the  village  assembly,  the  formation  of  co- 
operative societies  and  the  organisation  of  strikes  and  boycotts ; 
besides,  along  with  the  Peasants'  Union,  they  are  trying  to  get 
the  peasants  to  boycott  the  Government  saloons,  the  source  of 
half  of  its  net  income.  Long  before  the  beginning  of  the  pres- 
ent hypocritical  movement  among  the  reactionaries  against  the 
drink  evil,  the  revolutionists  had  declared  total  prohibition, 
aiming  to  save  the  peasants  morally  and  to  ruin  the  Govern- 
ment financially  at  a  single  stroke. 

Not  only  do  the  enlightened  revolutionists  consider  every 
form  of  organisation  as  of  utility  for  the  terrible  future  con- 
flicts, not  only  do  they  feel  that  good  revolutionary  fighters 
m.ust  be  sober  and  moral  in  their  habits  and  submissive  to  the 
will  of  the  community,  but  they  feel,  above  all,  the  need  of 
greater  intelligence.  Already  a  large  part  of  the  literature 
read  by  the  peasants  comes  from  the  secret  presses  of  this 
revolutionary  organisation.  Since  the  Government  forbids 
to  the  peasants  all  but  the  most  antiquated  and  stilted 
reading,  denying  them  nine-tenths  even  of  the  literature  that  is 
allowed  to  the  city  people  (we  have  seen  that  in  the  cities  many 
purely  scientific  and  literary  works  are  forbidden,  to  say  noth- 
ing of  histories),  the  revolutionists  have  supplied  the  lack  with 
popular  science,  history,  and  literature  from  their  own  stand- 
point. Chisko's  *'  History  of  Russia  "  has  been  circulated  to  the 
extent  of  half  a  million  copies,  which  means  that  nearly  every 
village  in  Russia  is  supplied  with  this  well  written  and  extremely 
revolutionary  book  that  sums  up  the  whole  history  of  the 
ruthless  and  brutal  oppression  of  the  Russian  peasants.  As 
Chisko  is  at  the  same  time  the  chief  theoretical  writer  of  the 
party,  we  can  see  what  an  influence  the  party  has  gained  over 
the  population  by  this  book  alone.  Besides,  there  are  hun4reds 
of  other  brochures  and  newspapers  of  the  greatest  popularity. 

Thus  far  it  has  seemed  that  the  Government  has  been  suc- 
ceeding gradually  in  suppressing  the  peasant  disorders,  but 


PLANNING  THE  WAR  389 

two  or  three  illustrations  will  show  how  ineradicable  the 
revolutionary  movement  has  become,  and  how  near  the  Govern- 
ment is  to  the  limit  of  its  power  for  checking  the  movement's 
growth.  So  frequent  have  attacks  on  and  executions  of  officials 
become  that  a  very  large  part  of  the  village  population  is 
already  more  or  less  involved  and  it  is  becoming  nearly  im- 
possible to  find  the  culprits.  In  a  recent  investigation  of  a 
killing  of  a  political  order,  the  guilty  party  was  found  to  be 
on  the  investigating  jury.  When  one  of  the  most  cruel  of  the 
German  barons  of  the  Baltic  Provinces,  Budberg,  was  killed 
on  the  way  from  his  estate,  there  was  no  way  of  finding  any 
trace  of  the  one  who  had  done  the  killing,  and  the  helpless 
Government,  feeling  that  it  had  to  do  something  if  such  acts 
were  not  to  be  encouraged  by  such  examples,  laid  a  heavy  fine 
on  the  two  villages  between  which  the  killing  had  occurred. 
As  the  fines  were  not  paid  troops  were  sent  to  seize  the  peas- 
ants* property.  By  this  act  the  Government  turned  all  the 
moderate  persons  in  the  village,  of  whom  there  were  doubt- 
less still  a  few,  into  bitter  revolutionists. 

Another  example  of  how  the  Government  is  reaching  the 
limit  of  its  powers  is  found  in  the  rural  guards,  recently  drawn 
from  the  ranks  of  the  people  and  still  in  many  cases  very  near 
to  them  in  their  sentiments.  It  is  upon  this  newly  created  army 
that  the  Government  must  rely  to  keep  order  in  the  country- 
side. I  found  recently,  for  instance,  that  the  brother  of  one 
of  these  guards  kept  the  supply  of  revolutionary  literature 
in  the  village.  In  many  cases  the  guards  have  refused  to  act 
against  rebellious  villagers,  finding  them  "in  the  right." 
When  a  village  is  not  able  to  win  the  friendship  of  the  rural 
guards,  it  is  often  able  to  frighten  them  into  powerlessness. 
It  finds  out  from  what  village  the  guard  comes  and  has  action 
taken  by  this  village  against  the  guard's  interests.  If  this 
measure  does  not  succeed  the  guards  are  often  attacked  by 
superior  numbers  and  disarmed.  In  one  case  the  peasantry 
were  able  to  get  the  better  of  sixty  of  them  and  seized  nearly 
two  hundred  rifles  and  three  hundred  pounds  of  cartridges. 
Another  measure  is  for  the  villagers  to  boycott  those  who  take 
in  the  rural  guards  for  the  night,  and  even  to  bum  down  the 
houses  of  the  villagers  who  show  the  enemy  any    friendship. 


390  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Certainly  it  seems  that  it  will  be  difficult  for  the  Government 
to  increase  very  largely  this  new  army  corps,  without  still 
further  increasing  at  the  same  time  the  number  of  its  mem- 
bers who  are  revolutionists  at  heart. 

The  guerilla  war  has  an  immediate  object,  to  drive  the  hated 
landlords  and  officials  from  the  countryside.  I  have  already 
pointed  out  that  the  peasants  have  achieved  some  success 
in  this  direction.  Formerly  it  was  required  that  the  land  offi- 
cials should  be  noblemen;  the  Government  has  found  so  much 
difficulty  in  getting  anyone  to  accept  this  dangerous  position, 
that  it  has  been  forced  to  abolish  the  rule,  and  even  then  the 
vacancies,  in  spite  of  the  enormous  power  of  the  office,  are 
frequently  unfilled. 

The  goal  of  the  new  revolutionary  movement  is  agreed  upon 
both  by  the  peasants  and  the  revolutionary  parties.  The  par- 
ties are  making  considerable  headway  toward  organising  the 
people  for  the  struggle  to  reach  this  goal,  and  it  is  even  clear 
that  the  leaders  needed  for  such  a  movement  will  not  be  lack- 
ing. One  of  the  most  popular  revolutionists  among  the  peas- 
ants, a  man  perhaps  who  has  longest  advocated  the  new  move- 
ment and  is  at  the  same  time  the  most  mature  of  its  leaders, 
Prince  Hilkhov,  feels  that  the  time  is  very  near  when  it  is  only 
a  question  of  securing  the  right  leaders  to  launch  the  movement. 
He  does  not  think  it  likely  that  the  movement  will  begin  in  an 
entirely  intelligent  and  revolutionary  manner;  he  believes  that 
it  is  likely  to  be  directed  rather  against  the  landlords  than 
against  the  Czar,  in  spite  of  the  efforts  of  the  revolutionists  and 
of  the  disillusionment  of  a  large  part  of  the  people  with  regard  to 
the  Emperor.  He  feels  that  another  Father  Gapon,  trusted 
by  the  peasants  as  was  Father  Gapon,  whether  he  deserved  it  or 
not,  by  the  workingmen,  will  some  day  lead  millions  to  a  half- 
blind  but  irresistible  revolt ;  and  that  when  such  a  movement 
is  once  started,  it  will  soon  pass  into  the  hands  of  the  revolu- 
tionists and  remain  there,  as  happened  with  the  Gapon  move- 
ment. 

The  most  important  psychological  element  in  the  conning 
conffict  Prince  Hilkhov  considers  to  be  the  people's  militant 
religious  instincts.  A  few  years  ago  the  Baptist  peasants  of 
his  village,  persecuted  to  despair  by  the  Government,  burned 


PLANNING  THE  WAR  391 

the  orthodox  church ;  every  time  two  or  three  met  together  to 
read  the  Bible  they  had  been  fined  fifty  rubles  as  a  penalty. 
These  peasants,  who  have  gone  freely  to  prison  and  exile  for 
their  beliefs,  have  now  been  reading  the  revolutionary  liter- 
ature; without  losing  any  interest  in  the  Bible,  they  have 
laid  it  temporarily  aside,  trying  to  inform  themselves  from 
political  literature  of  the  day  —  and  now  their  indomitable 
spirit  is  turning  into  politics  and  Socialism.  So  strong  is 
the  tendency  for  them  to  throw  their  religious  enthusiasm  into 
revolution,  that  the  police  have  vainly  urged  them  to  renew 
their  former  narrower  religious  activities.  Such  of  them  as 
have  been  arrested  for  their  political  ideas  and  held  in  prison 
for  several  months,  have  listened  to  the  orators  there  and 
returned  bringing  back  an  intensified  political  enthusiasm. 
This  idealism  and  enthusiasm,  Prince  Hilkhov  thinks,  can  be 
organised  by  some  popular  leader,  who  will  then  have  an 
unconquerable  army  to  lead  against  the  enemy.  So  sympa- 
thetic is  Hilkhov 's  grasp  of  this  religious  instinct  and  so  fervid 
is  his  revolutionary  spirit  that  one  cannot  help  supposing 
that  he  himself  might  prove  to  be  such  a  leader,  or  at  least  a 
power  behind  the  leader,  of  such  a  movement. 


CHAPTER  V 

HOW    THE    PRIESTS    ARE    BECOMING    REVOLUTIONISTS 

I  HAVE  been  speaking  at  such  length  of  the  economic 
problems  that  underlie  every  great  social  movement,  and 
have  given  so  much  attention  to  the  political  struggle  in  which 
the  economic  conflict  expresses  itself,  that  I  have  spoken  little 
of  the  quite  independent  spiritual  revolution  which  may  in  the 
end  have  as  great  an  influence  in  reshaping  the  destinies  of 
Russia's  one  hundred  and  forty  millions  as  the  political  and 
economic  revolution  itself. 

I  do  not  speak  of  the  spiritual  regeneration  of  Russia  as 
a  thing  apart.  If  the  Czarism  had  not  grown  so  infamous  as 
to  destroy  all  the  illusions  of  trusting  religious  natures  in 
the  possibility  of  benevolent  despotism  whether  in  State  or 
Church,  if  the  peasantry  had  not  evolved  out  of  the  most  elemen- 
tary human  instincts  a  fundamental  reaction  against  every 
form  of  oppression,  if  modern  capitalism  had  not  invaded  Rus- 
sia with  its  creation  of  new  industries  and  new  social  classes, 
if  modern  science  and  modern  ideas  had  not  taken  possession 
of  all  of  Russia's  intelligent  classes,  if  the  Duma  had  not  created 
a  centre  to  bring  all  these  democratic  tendencies  together  — 
then  the  spiritual  and  religious  revolution  could  never  have 
taken  a  general  and  national  form.  It  would  necessarily  have 
been  expressed,  as  for  generations  past,  in  the  personal 
revolts  of  unconquerable  individuals  or  in  the  localised,  poorly 
organised  and  by  no  means  entirely  enlightened  religious 
rebellion  of  Russia's  numerous  and  highly  interesting  religious 
sects. 

All  elements  of  the  people  recognise  that  something  of  the 
greatest  import  is  going  on  in  Russia's  religious  thought.  It 
is  imnecessary  to  show  how  general  this  recognition  is  since 
the  Government  itself  has  proposed  extraordinary  measures  to 
put  it  to  an  end.     The  first  of  such  measures  was  the  proposal 

392 


PRIESTS  ARE  BECOMING  REVOLUTIONISTS       395 

to  grant  what  the  Government  was  pleased  to  call  "religious 
freedom";  the  second,  equally  significant,  is  the  calling  of  the 
first  general  congress  of  the  Russian  Church.  It  is  hardly 
necessary  to  say  that  neither  have  the  foreign  religionists  in 
Russia  —  Catholics,  Mohammedans,  Lutherans,  or  Jews,  or  the 
Russian  sects,  or  the  half-orthodox  "old  believers"  —  been  in 
the  least  deluded  by  the  Government's  promises;  nor  have  the 
ordinary  members  of  the  Orthodox  Church,  the  liberal  element 
among  the  democratic  village  priests,  or  those  national  leaders 
clamouring  for  church  reform  who  have  developed  during  the 
recent  emancipation  movement,  put  any  hope  whatever  in  the 
promised  congress.  The  grounds  for  all  these  suspicions  are 
very  obvious 

The  Holy  Synod,  which  now  has  the  active  backing  not  only 
of  the  Government  but  of  at  least  one-third  of  the  artificially 
elected  reactionary  Duma  and  the  passive  support  of  perhaps 
two-thirds  of  that  body,  has  already  set  its  "interpretation"  on 
the  new  "religious  freedom."  Indicative  of  the  general  position 
taken  is  its  demand  that  no  new  religions  or  religious  sects  shall 
be  allowed  "except  if  subordinated  as  before  under  the  supreme 
spiritual  authorities."  The  Synod  has  also  practically  decided 
to  ask  for  the  maintenance  of  all  the  principal  elements  of  its 
control  over  religions  and  sects  already  "tolerated."  It 
holds  it  for  "its  holy  duty  to  insist  that  all  the  privileges  of  the 
Orthodox  Church  hitherto  existing  in  Russia  shall  be  reserved 
to  it  unchanged  in  the  future,  and  that  the  right  of  the  free 
propaganda  of  religious  teachings  shall  belong  alone  to  the 
Orthodox  Church,  while  all  other  religious  confessions  shall  be 
allowed  to  take  into  their  faiths  only  such  persons  as  come  over 
to  them  of  their  own  free  impulsion."  We  might  consider  this 
reactionary  proposal  as  merely  a  very  despotic  measure  of 
defence.  Other  parts  of  the  Synod's  "reforms,"  although  in  the 
same  defensive  guise,  are  really  almost  savagely  militant, 
reminding  one  of  the  persecutions  and  even  tortures  in  force 
recently  under  the  Pobiedonostzev  regime.  The  Synod  finds 
it  necessary  "in  order  to  protect  the  dignity  of  the  Orthodox 
Church  and  its  servants  against  attacks,  that  all  insults  and  ex- 
pressed contempt  of  its  laws  shall  be  severely  punished  whether 
they  take  place  in  ordinary  private  conversation  or  in  the  press 


394  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

or  in  representations  on  the  stage  "  — a  sort  of  a  law  of  Use  majesty 
of  the  church,  going  as  far  certainly  as  any  of  the  outrages  of 
the  past. 

Recently  the  convention  of  a  certain  society,  not  of  the  non- 
orthodox  but  of  the  half-orthodox  "old  believers, "  ordinarily 
most  loyal  to  the  Czar,  was  forbidden  in  Moscow  although  it 
had  held  its  sessions  free  and  unhindered  even  under  the  rule 
of  Minister  von  Plehve,  supposedly  the  most  oppressive  that 
Russia  has^  ever  endured ;  while  a  priest  of  this  creed  that  counts 
perhaps  fifteen  million  believers  in  Russia  was  punished  ''because 
he  had  had  friendly  intercourse  with  the  members  of  the  village 
and  had  been  able  to  convert  the  orthodox  to  the  '  old  believers* 
church." 

Known  to  the  whole  nation  and  even  more  outrageous  has 
been  the  attempt  of  the  State  to  coerce  the  priests  and  members 
of  the  Orthodox  Church  politically.  In  the  last  elections  in  the 
province  of  Tver,  for  instance,  the  bishop  required  twenty  priests 
that  had  been  chosen  as  electors  by  the  people  to  meet  in  his 
house  and  to  take  no  part  in  electoral  assemblies.  He  threatened 
that  he  would  deprive  them  of  their  positions  and  also  punish 
them  in  other  ways  if  they  did  not  vote  for  the  extreme  reaction- 
ary parties.  Everywhere  the  priests  were  instructed  by  their 
superiors  to  preach  from  the  pulpit  that  the  people  must  not 
elect  to  the  Duma  **  enemies  of  the  sacred  Faith  and  the  Throne." 
In  Voronege  the  Church  functionary,  Anastasius,  thundered 
against "  intellectual  rebels."  In  Bolkhov  the  head  priest  urged 
Ms  flock  to  choose  unlearned  men  and  true  Russians,  suggesting 
by  the  latter  phrase  members  of  the  massacre  organisations. 

Where  the  priests  did  not  wish  to  obey  the  ecclesiastical 
authorities  they  were  persecuted  and  dismissed  by  the  whole- 
sale. A  priest  of  the  town  of  Salucce  in  the  Government  of 
Tchemigov,  asked  by  his  parishioners  if  there  was  any  need 
of  beating  the  Jews  as  some  of  the  officials  were  instructing  them 
to  do,  replied,  "You  must  not  listen  if  anyone  advises  you  to  do 
such  a  thing,  even  if  the  person  that  does  it  wears  a  uniform  of 
the  police.  The  Jew  is  useful  to  us;  besides  he  must  be  pitied 
and  not  struck ;  he  works  for  his  family  and,  nevertheless,  remains 
very  poor;  he  has  not  enough  to  eat."  A  few  days  afterward 
the  parishioners  were  surprised  to  learn  that  their  priest  had 


PRIESTS  ARE  BECOMING  REVOLUTIONISTS         395 

been  thrown  into  prison.  Aroused  by  this  news  they  made  a 
collection  and  sent  a  telegram  to  Count  Witte.  Thirteen  days 
afterward  the  priest  was  released,  but  on  the  order  of  the 
bishop  he  was  excommunicated  and  deprived  of  his  robes. 
Accompanied  by  an  escort  of  Cossacks  to  protect  themselves 
from  the  enraged  populace,  who  knew  how  to  appreciate  this 
kind  of  priest,  the  clergy  came  to  the  village  to  make  an  inquiry 
and  found  nothing  against  him ;  but  the  order  remained  in  force 
and  the  priest  had  to  go  to  a  hospital  and  leave  his  family  with- 
out food  or  shelter. 

So  much  for  the  "religious  freedom"  and  the  political  freedom 
of  the  priest,  matters  of  general  interest  to  the  whole  population. 
The  proposed  Church  Council  is,  on  the  other  hand,  so  much 
a  Church  affair  that  it  is  best  understood  and  must  necessarily 
be  exposed  largely  by  the  lower  clergy  themselves,  without 
much  assistance  from  the  general  public  which  during  the  centuries 
of  the  State  Church  has  lost  all  interest  and  hope  of  participa- 
tion in  its  administration.  The  village  or  white  clergy,  so 
called  to  distinguish  them  from  the  black  clergy  or  monks  that 
furnish  the  higher  ecclesiastical  authorities,  is  almost  unani- 
mously opposed  to  the  new  Church  Council  —  because  they 
know  it  is  a  fraud,  but  equally  because  they  are  to  be  given 
no  voice  whatever  in  its  deliberations,  although  they  are  the 
only  ones  who  could  by  any  chance  bring  a  new  life  and  popu- 
larity to  the  Church.  At  a  recent  meeting  of  seventy-nine 
priests  from  all  parts  of  the  country,  it  was  decided  unanimously 
not  to  take  part  in  this  Council,  even  as  guests,  the  humiliating 
position  allotted  to  the  white  clergy.  At  the  same  time  it  was 
demanded  that  not  only  the  white  clergy,  but  also  the  people 
themselves,  should  be  allowed  active  participation  in  the  Council. 

The  white  clergy's  position,  then,  toward  the  official  religious 
reforms,  as  well  as  that  of  the  believers  and  clergy  of  all  other 
sects  and  creeds,  is  wholly  opposed  to  that  of  the  Government. 
I  except,  of  course,  the  very  numerous  cases  of  neutral  and 
timid  individuals  who  do  not  express  any  opinion  on  any  sub- 
ject. At  the  time  of  the  October  Manifesto  a  part  of  the  white 
clergy  explained  it  sympathetically  to  the  people.  They  were 
soon  seized  and  cast  into  prison,  so  that  in  many  parishes  no 
one  was  left  to  perform  the  religious  ceremonies.     In  many 


396  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

sections  there  were  meetings  of  priests  that  decided  it  was  high 
time  the  clergy  should  declare  themselves  in  relation  to  the 
emancipation  movement,  and  national  organisations  like  the 
"League  of  Workers  for  Church  Reform"  were  established. 
Moreover,  congresses  have  been  held  of  the  various  sects  hoping 
to  find  some  common  basis  for  a  sort  of  general  Protestant 
Church.  There  was  much  agreement  on  many  questions,  and 
it  was  only  a  rather  serious  contention  on  infants*  baptism 
that  prevented  some  kind  of  a  union. 

Most  significant  of  the  spirit  of  rebellion  has  been  the  partici- 
pation of  the  priests  in  the  Duma.  At  last,  in  the  third  Duma, 
by  the  combined  action  of  a  Chinese  election  law,  barbarous 
police  threats,  and  the  official  Church,  the  Czar  has  secured 
a  solid  delegation  of  some  forty  more  or  less  reactionary  priests. 
In  the  first  Duma,  elected  by  the  people,  there  were  several, 
radicals,  while  in  the  second  half  of  the  dozen  priests  elected 
were  distinctly  revolutionary.  The  Government  has  prosecuted 
six  of  them  because  of  their  political  attitude  and  convicted 
five.  The  most  revolutionary  was  the  priest  Brilliantov;  he 
was  accused  with  four  others  of  having  absented  himself  from 
the  Duma  when  a  resolution  condemning  political  assassinations 
was  being  voted  upon.  When  asked  for  an  explanation  of  his 
action,  he  refused  to  give  it  or  to  leave  the  Social  Revolutionary 
Party,  of  which  he  was,  and  still  is,  a  member.  Three  others* 
of  the  priests,  Tichvinski,  Archipov,  and  Kolokolnikov,  were 
members  of  the  Labour  Group,  and  this  membership  was  the 
accusation  against  them  on  the  part  of  the  Church,  which 
rightly  called  the  Labour  Group  a  revolutionary  organisation. 
On  technical  grounds  the  priests  denied  this  latter  accusation, 
but  they  did  not  deny  their  political  tenets  in  general  and  they 
were  all  unfrocked. 

Tichvinski,  the  most  important  of  the  three,  wrote  a  well 
known  letter  to  Metropolitan  Antonius,  explaining  his  political 
views. 

I,  a  former  reactionary  and  narrow-hearted  conservative,  have 
revised  my  views  in  the  course  of  four  years  under  the  influence  of  the 
needs  and  sufferings  of  the  people,  who  have  placed  their  conditions  be- 
fore the  priests ;  and  I  have  put  myself  on  the  side  of  the  interests  of  the 
people  and  of  a  legal  state.     Now  according  to  the  order  of  the  Synod  of 


PRIESTS  ARE  BECOMING  REVOLUTIONISTS        397 

12th  May,  in  the  course  of  three  days  I  must  turn  over  to  the  opposite 
side  "according  to  my  conscience,"  change  my  convictions  and  join  the 
reactionary  monarchists  or  the  independent  reactionaries.  We  are 
not  only  asked  formally  to  leave  our  party  but  according  to  conscience 
to  change  our  convictions.  I  declare  that  I  cannot  change  my  convic- 
tions. My  political  opinions,  all  my  economic  views,  my  Christian 
orthodox  standpoint,  my  activity  in  the  past,  are  known  to  you.  I  stand 
disclosed  before  you  and  I  have  talked  nothing  secretly.  These  my  con- 
victions, my  life,  my  activity  and  the  conduct  of  my  office,  are  known 
to  the  people  who  honour  me  with  their  confidence  through  my  election 
to  the  Duma.  How  can  I  change  my  convictions  without  becoming 
a  traitor  to  the  people  ?      Such  a  day  would  be  the  disgrace  of  my  life. 

The  persecutions  of  these  priests  only  began  with  their  ecclesi- 
astical punishment.  They  have  been  hounded  from  one  end 
of  the  Empire  to  the  other,  exiled  from  this  place  to  that  and 
always  prevented  from  undertaking  any  kind  of  fruitful  work. 
Two  who  tried  to  study  at  universities  were  driven  hither  and 
thither.  The  outright  revolutionist  Brilliantov  wrote  a  letter 
to  the  Social  Democrats  in  the  third  Duma  in  which  he  describes 
his  sufferings.  Studying  in  the  University  of  Tomsk,  he  was 
arrested  and  banished  from  Tomsk  and  forbidden  to  live  in 
Moscow,  anywhere  near  the  Siberian  railroad,  in  the  towns  of 
the  Caucasus,  and  so  on  and  so  on.  He  chose  Ufa  as  his 
dwelling  place  and  was  sent  there  on  foot,  but  when  he  arrived 
he  was  put  not  in  freedom  but  in  solitary  confinement.  He 
complained  bitterly  over  his  treatment.  He  wrote,  "On  what 
grounds  I  came  into  solitary  confinement  I  do  not  know.  I 
know  only  that  this  little  room  only  four  feet  long,  the  lack  of 
walks,  the  perpetual  half  darkness  of  the  room,  have  finally 
undermined  my  shattered  health." 

The  Government  did  not  suppress  the  revolutionary  feeling 
among  the  priests  by  these  persecutions.  Especially  note- 
worthy had  been  the  continued  denunciation  of  two  very  well 
known  priests,  both  of  high  rank  and  national  reputation. 
Father  Petrov  and  the  Archmandrite  Michael.  The  latter 
kept  up  a  continual  series  of  brilliant  letters  to  the  radical  press 
even  after  he  was  banished  to  a  monastery  on  a  dreary  island 
of  Lake  Ladoga.  Finally,  he  found  a  way  out  of  his  difficulties 
by  voluntarily  quitting  the  Church  and  joining  the  "old  believers." 
Indeed,  it  was  told  me  by  Father  Petrov  that  this  was  the 


398  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

most  practicable  step  for  all  the  radical  priests  and  would  per- 
haps lead  to  a  very  important  tendency  in  the  revolutionary 
movement.  The  "old  believers "  are  so  Russian  and  so  numerous 
that  State  policy  requires  that  they  be  granted  certain  moderate 
rights.  If  the  radical  priests  go  over  in  considerable  numbers 
to  this  church,  an  educated  leadership  now  waiting  will  be  sup- 
plied, and  a  new  and  powerful  revolutionary  force  created. 
Archmandrite  Michael  denounced  the  proposed  Church  Council 
as  a  fraud  before  he  quit  the  fold  and  fearlessly  demanded  a 
review  of  the  judgments  passed  against  the  revolutionary 
priests  of  the  first  and  second  Dumas.  He  questioned  whether 
the  people  of  the  Church  had  accepted  their  dismissal.  So 
radical  were  his  opinions  that  the  papers  in  which  they  were 
printed  were  confiscated  by  the  Government.  But  Michael 
could  not  be  gagged. 

The  most  striking  clerical  figure  that  has  been  developed 
so  far  in  the  course  of  the  recent  movement  is  Father  Petrov, 
a  figure  of  such  importance  that  he  promises  not  only  to  urge 
forward  the  coming  religious  transformation  but  also  to  furnish 
a  very  important  leader  for  the  revolutionary  movement  at 
large,  since  his  political  capacity  and  his  power  as  a  popular 
writer  are  as  great  as  his  influence  as  a  preacher  and  writer  of 
religious  tracts.  In  fact,  Father  Petrov  is  a  movement  in  him- 
self. The  author  of  a  hundred  religious,  moral,  political,  and 
social  pamphlets,  with  a  combined  circulation  of  more  than  ten 
million  copies,  he  is  master  of  a  style  so  popular  that  it  is  said 
that  the  peasants  read  him  with  greater  pleasure  than  they  do 
Tolstoi.  At  the  same  time  he  has  been  the  editor  of  the  most 
popular  newspaper  that  ever  circulated  among  the  Russian 
peasantry,  and  his  name  is  perhaps  as  well  known  to  the  people 
of  all  the  country  as  that  of  any  living  man. 

Most  interesting  in  the  personal  life  of  Father  Petrov  is  the 
fact  that  he  has  been  in  contact  with  the  whole  of  the  Russian 
people  from  the  peasantry  to  the  court.  For  years  the  tutor 
of  the  families  of  two  of  the  Grand  Dukes,  it  is  said,  on  the 
highest  authority,  that  he  was  selected  to  become  the  future 
tutor  of  the  Czarevitch,  the  heir  to  the  throne.  The  present 
Queen  of  Greece,  by  birth  a  member  of  Russia's  royal  family, 
was  such  an  admirer  of  his  that  she  alone  has  circulated,  it  is 


PRIESTS  ARE  BECOMING  REVOLUTIONISTS         39^ 

estimated,  a  million  of  his  pamphlets.  When  I  add  to  this  that 
Petrov  was  elected  to  the  second  Duma  from  St.  Petersburg  as 
one  of  the  small  nimiber  of  deputies  elected  by  the  capital,  not 
as  the  member  of  any  of  the  influential  parties  but  as  that  very 
rare  thing  in  the  Dumas,  an  independent,  we  begin  to  realise 
the  importance  of  the  rdle  he  has  played. 

Not  a  pope's  son,  like  most  of  the  priests,  he  chose  the  clergy 
freely  as  his  profession,  having  an  ambition  to  fill  the  r6le  of 
a  regenerator  of  the  true  religious  instincts  of  the  people. 
Brought  up  in  his  father's  grocery  store  in  a  village  near  St, 
Petersburg,  he  had  every  opportunity  of  observing  the  common 
people.  Like  Gorky,  he  became  especially  fond  of  tramps 
and  outcasts.  Feeling  at  the  same  time  their  misery  and  their 
humanity,  he  both  loved  them  and  thought  that  he  was  sent  by 
God  to  deliver  them  from  their  suffering.  When  he  taught 
later  in  an  aristocratic  school  he  saw,  he  assured  me,  that  these 
tramps  were  better  people  than  the  highest  aristocrats  in  the 
country. 

A  certain  ecclesiastical  law  allows  the  students  of  the  theolo- 
gical seminaries  to  preach.  Taking  advantage  of  this  law 
Petrov  often  returned  to  his  village  to  deliver  impromptu 
sermons  and  was  delighted  to  find  that  he  was  always  cble  to- 
interest  his  audience.  In  this  very  early  period  of  his  life  he 
had  already  conceived  the  idea  which  it  seems  to  me  is  his  con- 
tribution to  the  present  movement.  He  expressed  it  to  me  in 
these  words:  "Even  Kant  can  be  understood  by  the  people.'" 
This  assumption,  though  similar  to  Tolstoi's,  is  exactly  the 
opposite  to  that  of  all  the  Socialist  parties.  Conceiving  as  they 
do  the  economic  and  political  principles  of  the  emancipation 
movement  from  a  scientific  standpoint,  they  are  unable  to  bring 
them  into  popular  language  and  very  seldom  succeed  in  clothing 
them  in  flesh  and  blood.  Among  such  doctrinaires  the  opposite 
belief  of  Petrov  has  given  him  a  tremendous  importance. 
Almost  alone  among  the  important  leaders  he  believes  that  the 
people  understand  all  clear  language  and  clear  ideas  even  better 
than  do  the  educated  class. 

In  the  theological  seminary  he  was  intelligent  enough  to 
be  bitterly  disappointed.  Imagining  in  his  simplicity  that  all 
mysteries  would  be  explained  to  him  there,  he  rather  found  that. 


400  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

in  proportion  as  one  immersed  one's  self  in  the  theological 
studies,  one  was  buried  alive.  However,  students  of  the  theolo- 
gical seminaries  are  no  exception  to  the  general  rule  for  Russian 
students.  Even  they  are  imbued  with  the  current  revolutionary 
and  Socialist  ideas  and  know  what  independent  thinking  means. 
So  far  has  this  gone  that  recently  nearly  all  the  theological  stu- 
dents of  a  certain  province,  after  graduation,  refused  to  go  into 
the  ministry  and  the  whole  province  is  short  of  preachers.  Father 
Petrov  then  was  able  without  much  difficulty  to  form  a  small 
group  of  students  to  read  history,  literature  and  philosophy, 
and  it  was  in  this  group,  he  told  me,  that  he  got  an  entirely 
different  and  broader  conception  of  life.  Among  the  influ- 
ences that  he  fell  under  at  this  time  he  places  second  to  none 
Ruskin  and  Carlyle.  He  was  especially  impressed  with  a  story 
of  Ruskin 's  who,  seeing  an  announcement  that  prayer  was  to  be 
5aid  to  God  in  a  certain  church  between  nine  and  eleven,  asked 
"to  whom  do  you  pray  before  nine?"  This  expresses  Petrov 's 
fundamental  religious  feeling  that  all  life  should  be  prayer  and 
that  mere  words  were  useless. 

After  graduation  from  the  seminary  Father  Petrov  went  to 
preach  in  the  slaughter-houses  near  St.  Petersburg,  where  for  six 
years  he  delivered  eight  to  ten  lectures  a  week,  attaining  a 
tremendous  popularity  among  the  peasants  and  working  people. 
It  was  through  the  common  people  indeed  that  he  was  introduced 
to  the  upper  classes.  A  servant  in  the  family  of  the  Grand  Duke 
Paul  heard  of  him  and  begged  his  master  to  have  him  give  a  pri- 
vate sermon.  This  was  arranged  and  he  was  taken  into  the 
family  of  the  Grand  Dukes  Paul  and  Constantine  as  teacher 
of  their  children  He  lectured  everywhere  among  fashionable 
schools  and  organisations,  in  the  pages  corps,  in  the  Guards,  and 
so  on.     He  says  he  might  have  filled  sixty  hours  a  day. 

Before  he  accepted  this  opportunity  to  work  among  the  court 
circles,  as  a  profound  democrat  he  hesitated.  It  was  only  after 
long  arguments  that  his  comrades  persuaded  him  to  accept, 
since  the  fate  of  Russia  was  entirely  in  the  hands  of  these  peo- 
ple. But  he  soon  found  that  he  had  made  a  mistake.  "While 
the  common  people  want  light  like  grass  wants  the  sun,"  he  said, 
"the  nobility  are  a  separate  race  entirely;  they  cannot  under- 
stand the  wants  of  the  people.     They  read  willingly  what    I 


photograph  by  CuUa,  St.  Petersburg 

TWO    REVOLUTIONARY   PRIESTS 

Left,  Father  Petrov,  the  most  famous  churchman  of  Russia,  former  pastor  to  a 

grand  duke;  right,  Father  Kolokolnikov 


^         OF  THE        r 

P    UNIVERSITY 


I     lt-^r^%.^ 


PRIESTS  ARE  BECOMING  REVOLUTIONISTS         401 

wrote,  but  they  admired  only  the  figures  of  speech  and  phrases, 
in  the  same  way  as  they  would  a  pretty  landscape  painting  or 
society  poem.  The  children  of  the  grand  dukes  and  nobility 
cannot  understand ;  they  are  taught  from  the  first  that  they  are 
superhuman  and  different  from  other  people.  One  girl  exclaimed 
to  me  once,  *  How  difficult  it  is  to  be  human  in  the  Court! '  She 
had  a  true  human  instinct,  but  the  teachers  do  not  appeal  to 
and  awaken  such  higher  instincts,  but  only  the  lower." 

Father  Petrov  learned  very  much  in  the  court.  He  met 
not  only  Russian  but  also  foreign  aristocrats.  He  found  that 
everywhere  the  aristocracy  feel  that  the  people  must  be  thank- 
ful to  them,  that  Russia  or  any  other  country  in  their  power 
is  merely  a  private  estate,  that  the  masses  should  be  glad  to 
pick  up  what  falls  from  their  table,  that  the  people  owe  every- 
thing to  the  aristocracy  and  the  aristocracy  nothing  to  the 
people.  In  1904  he  met  the  Grand  Duke  Sergius  whom  he 
found  had  read  his  book,  "The  Evangel  as  the  Basis  of  Life." 
The  murderous  grand  duke  remarked:  "You  reformers  are  all 
dreamers ;  the  people  are  all  beasts ;  they  only  understand  what 
is  taught  them  with  the  fist  and  the  'nagaika.'"  Petrov 
answered:  "You  said  that  to  the  Japanese  and  they  replied 
with  a  still  heavier  fist.     That  is  what  the  people  will  do  to  you." 

Father  Petrov  withdrew  from  the  court  circles,  but  at  the 
time  of  the  October  Manifesto  was  still  professor  in  the  theo- 
logical and  military  academies.  He  soon  saw  it  was  impossible 
to  continue  even  in  this  work.  He  thinks  that  the  gulf  is  so  wide 
between  the  people  and  the  ruling  class  that  it  is  impossible 
to  stand  with  one  foot  on  either  side,  and  so  he  left  the  ruling 
class.  During  the  year  and  a  half  that  elapsed  before  the 
elections  to  the  second  Duma  he  occupied  himself  almost 
entirely  with  his  writing  and  the  editorship  of  his  wonderfully 
popular  paper,  God's  Truth.  He  attributes  his  success  to  the 
fact  that  he  came  from  the  people,  that  they  know  that  his 
heart  beats  with  them,  that  they  understand  that  he  knows 
their  wants  and  is  ready  to  give  up  his  life  if  necessary  in  their 
behalf.  Servants,  cabdrivers,  and  other  common  people  used 
to  come  to  his  office  to  ask  not  for  God's  Truth,  but  for  "our" 
paper. 


CHAPTER  VI 


THE    RELIGIOUS    REVOLUTION 


AFTER  his  election  to  the  Duma  from  St.  Petersburg  in 
February,  1906,  by  an  immense  majority,  Father  Petrov 
was  immediately  banished  to  a  monastery  by  the  Holy  Synod 
and  returned  only  when  the  Duma  was  dissolved.  He  was 
dismissed  then  by  the  order  of  the  Holy  Synod  from  all  the 
schools  and  colleges  in  which  he  had  taught  and  was  forbidden 
to  preach  in  any  church.  However,  his  paper,  God's  Truths 
attained  enormous  success  among  the  masses  of  the  people  both 
of  the  cities  and  of  the  villages.  I  was  assured  by  those  able  to 
judge  that  nothing  ever  written  in  Russia  reached  more  directly 
to  the  heart  of  the  people,  and  I  was  unable  to  find  any  illiterate 
cabdriver  or  peasant  who  had  not  heard  of  Father  Petrov. 
When  I  asked  the  opinion  of  some  common  man  about  him 
I  was  always  answered:  "How  could  we  fail  to  be  pleased  by 
what  he  writes;  it  is  God's  truth." 

During  a  few  months  twenty -seven  prosecutions  were  started 
against  him  with  a  view  to  depriving  him  of  his  robe  and  civic 
rights.  On  all  occasions  he  was  able  to  prove  that  neither 
he  nor  his  writings  had  ever  turned  aside  from  Christianity. 
At  last,  in  the  beginning  of  1908,  he  saw  that  the  Government 
would  condemn  him  to  be  unfrocked  in  spite  of  anything  that 
he  could  do,  and  taking  the  advantage  of  the  prestige  of  his 
robe  before  he  was  deprived  of  it  he  wrote  a  public  letter  to 
Russia  and  the  world. 

In  order  that  this  important  letter  should  not  be  suppressed 
Father  Petrov  addressed  it  not  only  to  the  Holy  Synod,  but 
to  the  somewhat  liberal  Metropolitan  of  St.  Petersburg,  Anto- 
niuis,  and  also  mailed  copies  to  all  the  ministers  and  to  persons 
who  would  assure  its  publicity.  Within  a  few  days  he  met 
his  punishment.  He  was  deprived  of  his  robes,  the  right  of 
residence  in  St.  Petersburg  or  Moscow  for  seven  years,  and  of 

402 


THE  RELIGIOUS  REVOLUTION  403 

most  of  the  other  privileges,  such  as  they  are,  of  the  Russian 
citizen.  Strong  as  are  the  denunciations  of  the  Czar  in  this 
letter.  Father  Petrov  is  so  popular  in  Russia  and  so  known  abroad 
that,  as  in  the  case  of  Tolstoi,  the  Government  did  not  dare  to 
go  further.  I  give  a  large  part  of  this  very  important  letter, 
summing  up  as  it  does  the  situation  of  the  Russian  church 
and  the  attitude  of  a  large  majority  of  liberal  Russians,  whether 
priests  or  laymen,  on  the  condition  of  the  Church  and  the  feeling 
of  truly  religious  persons  about  the  Czarism  and  the  revolution. 

Your  High  Eminence,  Lord  Antonius: 

.  .  .  The  second  accusation  was  founded  on  complaints  against 
my  work  and  speeches.  From  these  complaints  the  ecclesiastical  in- 
vestigators drew  up  a  long  series  of  questions.  To  reply  to  all  these 
questions  would  be  easy  for  me  and  I  could  have  closed  the  affair  in 
this  way,  but  such  replies  would  not  have  satisfied  the  questions  that  I 
have  put  to  myself. 

The  thing  which  our  Holy  Synod  passed  for  the  Orthodox  Church  and 
the  composition  of  the  Synod  itself,  can  these  be  considered  as  at  all 
the  true  church  of  Christ?  Am  I  in  accord  at  all  points  with  the 
Synod  and  the  Orthodox  Church  ?  If  I  differ,  in  what  and  upon  what  are 
the  differences  founded? 

To  reply  to  these  questions  that  I  have  put  to  myself,  I  have  preferred, 
instead  of  addressing  myself  to  the  ecclesiastical  prosecutors,  to  send  to 
Your  Highness  an  exposition  of  my  religious  opinions  and  of  the  political 
opinions  which  result  from  them      .     .     . 

I  am  explaining  my  whole  way  of  understanding  the  duty  of  the 
Church  at  the  present  moment.  My  conscience  demands  it.  You  will 
act  as  yours  commands  you  to  act. 

We  have  to-day,  after  nineteen  centuries  of  preaching,  individual 
Christians,  separate  persons,  but  no  Christianity;  there  is  no  Christian 
legislation;  our  customs  and  morals  are  no  longer  Christian;  there  exists 
no  Christian  government.  It  is  strange  to  speak  of  the  Christian  world. 
The  mutual  relations  of  the  various  peoples  are  altogether  contrary  to  the 
spirit  of  the  Evangel;  the  most  Christian  states  maintain  millions  of 
men  for  mass  butcheries,  sometimes  of  their  neighbours  and  sometimes 
of  their  own  citizens. 

To  justify  these  monstrous  butcheries  the  very  soul  of  the  mystified 
population  is  sapped  away.  The  same  butcheries  are  erected  into  a 
science.  They  are  the  object  of  the  military  art,  the  art  of  killing.  In 
what  way  are  these  relations  of  Christian  people  distinct  from  the  rela- 
tions of  the  people  of  pagan  antiquity?  Governments  violate,  states 
oppress,  entire  populations.  Kings  look  at  their  countries  as  their  prop- 
erty; at  the  people  as  their  herds.  They  do  not  serve  the  people  but 
they  demand  that  the  people  serve  them.     They  try  to  replace  the  will 


404  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

of  the  nations  by  their  own  desires  and  even  by  their  caprices.  Every 
year  they  plunder  the  poor  population  of  millions  for  their  palaces,  and 
such  a  state  of  affairs  is  called  legal! 

On  the  other  hand,  the  demand  of  the  people  addressed  to  the  king 
to  recognise  the  rights  of  the  nation,  is  a  crime  to  be  pitilessly  punished. 
With  what  cruelty  Christian  Czars  have  made  the  blood  of  the  people 
flow,  when  attempts  have  been  made  by  the  latter  to  find  some  relief 
for  their  sad  destiny.  What  pitiless  brutality  there  is  in  the  punishment 
that  they  have  let  fall  on  countries  already  enough  oppressed 

There  is  no  Christian  Czar  and  no  Christian  government.  Conditions 
of  life  are  not  Christian.  The  upper  classes  rule  the  lower  classes.  A 
little  group  keeps  the  rest  of  the  population  enslaved.  This  little  group 
has  robbed  the  working  people  of  wealth,  power,  science,  art,  and  even 
religion,  which  they  have  also  subjected;  they  have  left  them  only 
ignorance  and  misery.  In  the  place  of  pleasure  they  have  given  the 
people  drunkenness;  in  the  place  of  religion  gross  superstition;  and  be- 
sides, the  work  of  a  convict,  a  work  without  rest  or  reward.  That  which 
the  upper  class  have  taken  either  by  force  or  by  artifice  they  have  called 
their  sacred  property.  When  the  nobility  had  serfs  the  latter  were  very 
sacred  property;  at  present  some  of  them  have  taken  possession  of  the 
land  and  this  they  call  the  sacred  property.  If  the  rich  had  been  able 
to  take  the  sky,  the  air,  the  sea,  or  the  stars,  they  would  still  have  called 
all  this  their  sacred  property.  They  squeeze  out  heavy  rents  for  the 
maintenance  of  their  idleness,  and  when  the  people,  brought  nearly  to 
exhaustion  by  suffering,  outraged  in  its  highest  feelings,  speaks  of  rights, 
demands  for  its  labour  a  part  of  their  abundance,  the  rich  classes  send 
against  it  with  cannons  and  bayonets  its  own  brothers  —  only  dressed 
up  in  the  uniforms  of  soldiers  and  transformed  by  barrack  drill  into  a 
machine  that  kills. 

It  that  Christianity? 

The  true  servant  of  the  true  Church  and  Christ,  John  Slatoust,  said 
in  discussing  the  question  of  the  unequal  distribution  of  wealth  in  society, 
"Every  rich  man  is  a  criminal  or  the  son  of  a  criminal."  Those  whom 
he  attacked  rebelled  at  this  declaration.  He  replied  to  them,  "My  speech 
puts  you  out  of  temper.  You  say  to  me,  when  will  you  cease  to  speak 
against  the  rich;  I  answer,  when  you  cease  to  oppress  the  poor.  What, 
you  cry  out,  more  thunders  against  the  rich?  Against  your  cruelty 
to  the  poor!  You  abuse  without  check  your  power  over  the  poor  and  me, 
and  I  will  never  check  my  curses." 

But  the  words  of  John  Slatoust,  like  the  words  of  several  other  fathers 
of  the  Church,  were  only  rare  rays  of  light  which  scarcely  pierced  the 
thick  fog  of  satiety  of  the  rich  classes.  The  unequal  distribution  of 
wealth  is  being  corrected  by  charity.  An  infinitesimal  part  of  what 
has  been  taken  away  from  them  is  given  back  to  the  disinherited,  and 
this  passes  for  a  virtue!  As  to  the  crying  misery  of  millions  of  working 
people  alongside  of  the  extraordinary  opulence  of  the  rich  classes,  the 
preachers  say:  "It  has  pleased  God  that  it  should  be  so.     Where  there 


THE  RELIGIOUS  REVOLUTION  405 

is  light  there  is  always  shadow."  Such  preachings  are  a  calumny  of 
God     .     .     . 

Christian  morality  would  have  been  limited  and  little  developed  if  it 
had  had  no  other  end  but  the  life  and  conduct  of  private  persons  with- 
out throwing  light  on  the  organisations,  the  rulers,  the  life  and  conduct 
of  societies  and  states.  "But  that  is  politics,"  says  the  clergy;  "our 
business  is  religion."     .     .     . 

True  politics  is  in  fact  the  art  of  the  better  organisation  of  life  in 
society  and  the  state;  but  is  not  the  Evangel,  with  its  doctrine  of  the 
Kingdom  of  God,  the  science  of  the  better  organisation  of  life,  of  society, 
and  of  the  entire  State?  This  being  true  the  clergy  cannot  say  that 
politics  is  the  business  of  politicians ;  it  cannot  say  that  the  labour  ques- 
tion, the  agrarian  question,  the  question  of  the  class  and  race  hatred  in 
the  State  does  not  concern  them,  for  these  are  just  the  questions  that  do 
concern  them     .     .     . 

But  Christianity  has  become  the  State  religion  before  the  State  has 
ceased  to  be  pagan.  How  should  we  explain  otherwise  the  fact  that  the 
influence  of  Christianity  has  not  really  been  exerted  on  the  laws  of  society 
and  the  organisation  of  the  State?  The  Evangel,  from  the  broad  road 
of  the  organisation  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  in  societies  and  states,  has 
had  to  pass  into  the  narrow  path  of  personal  virtues  and  the  salvation 
of  the  individual.  How  has  this  happened?  Christianity  itself  is 
accused.  Defects  are  sought  for  in  the  doctrine  of  Christ;  this  is  wrong, 
for  it  is  the  fault  rather  of  the  higher  clergy  which  in  spite  of  the  triumph 
of  Christianity  has  not  been  able  to  resist  the  seduction  of  power.  It  is 
not  the  clergy  that  has  influenced  the  State,  but  on  the  contrary,  it 
has  borrowed  from  the  State  its  external  brilliance,  its  organisation,  its 
means  of  action,  its  constraint  and  its  non-spiritual  punishments     .     .     . 

The  Papistry  is  not  the  disease  of  the  Roman  clergy  alone.  All  the 
Christian  religions  suffer  from  some  form  of  Papistry.  The  Greek  Church 
no  less  than  the  others.  As  in  the  West,  the  higher  clergy  aspire  greedily 
for  power,  but  it  could  not  conquer  the  imperial  power  so  mighty  here  in 
the  East.  And  it  did  not  even  conceive  such  a  notion ;  it  directed  all  its 
greed  to  the  interior  of  the  church,  pushed  aside  the  lower  clergy  and 
the  faithful  and  said  to  them:  L'Eglise,  c'est  tnoi  I  And  to  enjoy  with- 
out any  obstacle  from  the  Government  a  complete  administrative  power, 
the  princes  of  the  Church  shared  with  the  Government.  They  left  to  it 
sovereign  power  over  society  and  the  State,  and  they  reserved  for  them- 
selves the  direction  of  the  Church  .  .  .  The  clergy  governed  the 
Church  and  submitted  to  the  temporal  authorities  and  served  them  as 
a  docile  tool  .  .  .  Whatever  crimes  the  authorities  accomplished, 
the  clergy  repeated  invariably  to  the  people:  "Obey  and  submit;  God 
requires  it."     Or  still  further,  "All  authority  comes  from  God." 

All  over  oui  country  every  day  are  proceeding  executions  by  shooting 
and  hanging.  It  is  all  done  at  the  order  of  the  power  of  the  authorities. 
The  hangman  builds  the  gallows  and  throttles  the  victim  with  the  rope. 
But  it  is  not  the  hangman  that  kills.     He  is  but  an  instrument  connected 


4o6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

with  the  execution,  like  the  gallows  and  the  noose.  It  is  the  high- 
placed  executioner  who  kills.  The  judge  who  passes  the  death  sentence, 
the  administrator  who  sanctions  the  sentence.  It  is  the  minister  who 
covers  the  face  of  the  country  with  the  gallows,  who  sees  in  the  gallows 
the  support  and  upholder  of  his  power  —  he  it  is  who  throttles.  It 
is  the  sovereign  power  that  throttles,  the  sovereign  who  appoints  the 
hangman  minister.  A  whole  hierarchy  of  authorities  strangles  people 
already  bound  and  solitary,  already  rendered  harmless;  in  the  place 
of  giving  justice  it  gives  proof  of  an  unrivaled,  cowardly  and  cruel  spirit 
of  revenge. 

Can  one  say  that  such  authorities  are  placed  there  by  God? 

The  ruling  regular  clergy,  with  its  cold,  heartless,  bony  fingers,  has 
stifled  the  Russian  Church,  killed  its  creative  spirit,  chained  the  Gospel 
itself,  and  sold  the  Church  to  the  Government.  There  is  no  outrage,  no 
crime,  no  perfidy  of  the  State  authorities  which  the  monks  who  rule  the 
Church  would  not  cover  with  the  mantle  of  the  Church,  would  not  bless, 
would  not  seal  with  their  own  hands.  What  power  would  the  voice  of  the 
Church  possess  were  i^  raised  in  genuine  Christian  words!  If  it  should 
speak  them  to  the  rulers  and  to  the  people,  to  revolutionists  and  to 
reactionaries,  if  it  should  speak  to  the  whole  country!  Such  words  would 
become  the  voice  of  the  eternal  Gospel  truths  addressed  to  the  conscience 
of  the  country.  They  would  strike  every  heart,  they  would  penetrate 
into  every  corner,  they  would  chime  above  the  thunders  of  revolution, 
above  the  clamour  of  execution,  like  the  voice  of  a  church-bell  through 
the  howling  of  the  tempest. 

When  on  January  22,  1905,  the  people,  that  immense,  naive  child, 
went  with  ikons  and  crosses  to  beg  the  authorities  for  truth  and  justice, 
in  answer  to  them  was  arranged  a  monstrous  onslaught ;  when  the  bleed- 
ing heaps  upon  the  square  made  the  whole  world  shudder,  the  Synod 
approached  the  quivering  mass  of  bodies  not  yet  cool,  stopped  before  them, 
and  in  a  priestly  message  struck  them  with  a  vile  and  brutal  libel.  It 
declared  that  the  murdered  ones  were  not  seekers  of  justice,  that  they 
were  Japanese  agents,  bought  by  Japanese  money.  The  Synod  could 
not  find  one  word  of  reproach  for  the  murderers,  one  sigh  for  the  victims  — 
nothing  but  a  libel.  A  libel  signed  by  the  Synod  in  the  name  of  the 
whole    Church. 

In  the  Church  the  creative  power  of  truth  became  withered,  dried,  and 
anaemic ;  separated  from  life,  the  thought  of  the  Church  was  condemned 
to  turn  about  in  the  world  of  abstract  dogma  and  theological  discussions. 
God  was  reasoned  about  without  being  introduced  into  life 
itself.  A  sort  of  special  Atheism  was  created,  practical  Atheism.  Cer- 
tainly in  words  and  thoughts  the  existence  of  God  was  recognised,  but 
life  activity  went  forward  as  if  it  was  not  so,  as  if  God  was  only  an  ab- 
stract word,  a  sound  without  meaning.  An  example  of  such  practical 
Atheism  is  Pobiedonostzev,  of  sad  memory,  or  rather  the  tendency  of  the 
life  of  the  Church  that  has  borrowed  his  name.  This  tendency  was  in- 
deed not  created  by  him  for  it  existed  before  and  after.     He  only  put 


THE  RELIGIOUS  REVOLUTION  407 

strongly  in  relief  this  current  of  clerical  life ;  it  is  the  same  morally  anaemic, 
Byzantine  spirit  which  drove  Christianity  from  the  Church  and  sub- 
stituted itself  in  its  place.  .  .  .  The  principal  aim  of  his  Church  was 
the  same  as  that  of  the  Papacy:  to  replace  the  Kingdom  of  God  by  the 
kingdom  of  the  princes  of  the  Church  and  the  reigning  monks.  Sepa- 
rated by  an  asceticism,  by  their  monk's  mantle,  from  all  the  joys  of  the 
world,  even  the  most  pure,  the  reigning  monks  tried  to  find  consolation 
in  what  they  had  repudiated  —  in  their  power  over  the  world 
We  have  no  Papacy  but  we  have  what  is  called  correctly  the  Papacy 
of  the  Czar.  With  us  even  in  the  code  (Vol.  I,  Chap.  VII,  Art.  42)  the 
sovereign  is  called  Lord  of  the  Church,  Lord  even  with  a  capital  L.  In 
the  true  Church  the  Lord  is  Christ.  In  the  Papacy  the  chief  of  the  state 
is  the  pope,  and  in  the  Russian  Church  it  is  the  sovereign     .     .     . 

The  majority  of  the  lower  clergy  is  ignorant,  poor,  dulled;  nobody 
occupies  himself  with  its  moral  welfare.  It  is  crowded  by  the  reigning 
monks  into  a  corner,  it  has  its  arms  tied;  it  is  deprived  of  the  liberty  to 
think,  to  speak  and  to  act.  They  who  are  so  near  to  the  masses  of  the 
people,  to  the  centre  of  life,  they  who  see  all  its  misery,  the  deprivation 
of  justice  from  which  the  whole  country  suflfers,  who  hear  the  ceaseless 
groans  that  rise  from  below,  who  are  choked  by  the  tears  of  the  people, 
blinded  by  the  sight  of  the  frightful  nightmare  created  all  over  the  coun- 
try by  the  impious  violence  of  the  reigning  power,  they  have  not  even  the 
right  to  speak  of  the  sufferings  of  their  flocks,  not  even  the  chance  to 
cry  out  to  the  violators,  halt!     .     .     . 

Indeed,  according  to  the  opinion  of  the  monks,  who  are  at  the  same 
time  reigning  dignitaries  of  the  Church,  all  that  goes  against  the  State 
goes  against  the  Church,  against  Christ  and  against  God.  This  is  to 
reduce  the  great  work  of  the  salvation  of  humanity  to  the  petty  r61e  of 
bodyguard  to  the  temporal  autocratic  organization  .  .  .  The  Church 
is  the  universal  union,  the  organisation  of  all  humanity,  above  nations 
and  states.  For  to  the  Church  none  of  the  existing  organisations  of  the 
State  are  invariable,  perfect,  permanent,  or  infallible. 

Such  an  organisation  is  the  work  of  the  future;  expressing  one's  self  in 
the  language  of  the  Evangel,  it  will  be  the  future  Kingdom  of  God.  An 
organisation  in  which  everything  will  be  maintained  not  by  external 
violence  but  by  a  common  interior  moral  bond,  in  which  there  will  be 
neither  exploitation  nor  arbitrary  government  nor  violence  nor  master 
nor  workman,  where  all  will  support  equally  the  burdens  of  life  and  all 
will  profit  equally  from  its  good.  This  is  the  task  of  the  Church,  but 
the  organisations  which  exist  at  present,  whether  they  are  autocratic  or 
not,  are  worth  nothing.  Their  only  difference  is  in  the  degree  of  useless- 
ness;  one  is  more,  another  is  less  useful;  yet  our  old  expiring  organisation 
is  the  worst  of  all  that  exists  in  the  Christian  world. 

Of  course  this  letter  made  it  unnecessary  for  the  Synod  to 
carry  to  a  finality  its  other  prosecutions  that  contained  such 
accusations  as  that,  on  a  visit  at  Yasnaya  Polyana  he  had  asked 


4o8  RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 

Count  Tolstoi  (excommunicated,  it  will  be  remembered,  from 
the  Orthodox  Church),  for  his  blessing  on  his  work,  and  that 
during  a  visit  in  the  Crimea  he  had  spent  most  of  his  time  with 
two  Jews. 

Father  Petrov  is  more  than  the  most  formidable  enemy, 
aside  from  Tolstoi,  of  the  Russian  State  Church.  He  is  an 
independent  religious  and  political  thinker  and  leader;  in  fact, 
the  great  interest  of  his  standpoint  is  that  he  neither  separates 
politics  and  religion,  nor  allows  one  to  interfere  with  the  other. 
In  many  countries  he  might  be  classed  in  spite  of  himself  as 
a  Christian  Socialist,  but  he  objects  vigorously  to  this  term. 
He  says  he  is  a  Christian  and  a  Socialist  but  that  his  Socialism 
and  his  Christianity  are  both  unquaHfied,  He  wishes  to  be 
considered  simply  a  Christian  and  not  a  Christian  of  any  par- 
ticular sect,  objecting,  therefore,  even  to  the  limitation  of  the 
social  obligations  of  his  Christianity  implied  by  the  term  * '  Chris- 
tian Socialist."  He  is  a  Socialist,  differing  from  the  others 
only  in  that  he  has  arrived  at  precisely  the  same  point  by  the 
religious  path  instead  of  the  study  of  Marx  or  the  indirect 
experience  of  the  economic  conflict.  He  does  not  wish  to 
differentiate  himself  from  other  Socialists  by  qualifying  himself 
as  a  Christian  Socialist. 

We  might  be  tempted  to  compare  him  in  some  respects  with 
Tolstoi;  but  the  difference  is  profound.  He  is  a  great  admirer 
of  Tolstoi,  for  he  says  that  the  latter  has  done  an  incalculable 
service  to  Russia  in  reviving  the  interest  in  the  Evangels  among 
educated  classes  at  the  very  moment  when  Buchner,  Darwin,  and 
materialism  were  sweeping  all  before  them.  He  shares  Tol- 
stoi's indifference  to  mere  political  forms,  but  he  does  not 
share  his  indifference  to  the  organisation  of  the  future  state. 
Tolstoi  confesses  himself  to  be  an  anarchist  in  the  philosophical 
sense.  Petrov  is  a  Socialist  and  hopes  that  the  spirit  of  Chris- 
tianity will  not  destroy  but  regenerate  the  State.  Indeed, 
in  one  of  his  brochures  he  goes  so  far  as  to  express  a  preference 
for  the  republican  form  of  government  which  with  Tolstoi  meets 
almost  the  same  contempt  as  does  the  Czarism  itself.  Like 
Tolstoi,  Petrov  is  interested  in  the  psychology  of  the  ruling 
classes,  and  it  is  because  he  understands  this  psychology  so  well 
that  he  denounces  this  class.     For  these  denunciations  he   ex- 


THE  RELIGIOUS  REVOLUTION  40^ 

pects  to  be  considered  wild,  seditious,  revolutionary,  and 
criminal,  just  as  those  who  denounced  serfdom  a  generation 
ago  were  branded  by  these  same  terms  of  reproach. 

Like  Tolstoi,  Petrov's  attitude  toward  existing  society  is 
that  of  a  revolutionist.  "In  other  forms  and  with  certain 
changed  aspects,"  he  says  in  a  typical  message,  "the  relation 
of  the  slave-driver  and  serf-holder  to  the  lower  strata  of  the 
people  remains  in  force  in  our  own  day.  The  majority  of 
people  of  our  time  who  have  privilege  or  power  either  through 
capital  or  noble  birth,  have  not  learned  to  understand  that  no 
one  has  the  right  to  exploit  another,  to  turn  a  man  like  himself 
into  a  tool  as  a  means  of  promoting  his  own  welfare,  and  that- 
all  privilege  is  not  lawful  and  right,  but  unlawful,  violent,, 
unjust.  All  men  are  men.  All  have  the  same  right  of  the 
recognition  of  their  personality.  Nature,  which  created  man 
and  the  means  of  his  existence,  does  not  know  of  any  selection 
and  special  favouritism." 

But  Father  Petrov  is  not  a  revolutionist  who  places  his 
sole  hope  on  the  regeneration  of  the  individual,  as  does 
Tolstoi.  He  seeks  rather  a  regeneration  of  both  the  Church 
and  the  State,  his  efforts  being  equally  directed  to  remove 
the  growing  "contempt  and  hatred"  of  the  people  toward  the- 
clergy,  and  to  introduce  democracy  and  Socialism  into  the  State. 
In  his  politics  he  has  nothing  in  common  with  the  moderates^ 
just  as  he  has  perhaps  nothing  in  common  with  the  violent 
revolutionists.  He  felt  bitterly  toward  the  pusillanimous- 
attitude  of  the  Constitutional  Democratic  party  in  the  second 
Duma,  who  in  order  to  persuade  the  Czar  not  to  dismiss  the 
Duma  were  ready  to  concede  everything  to  the  Government. 
Petrov  thought,  on  the  contrary,  that  as  long  as  the  Duma 
existed  it  ought  to  have  been  worthy  of  its  task,  outspoken 
on  every  question  and  ready  to  submit  to  the  Czar  on  none. 

Father  Petrov  does  not  believe  in  the  possibility  of  a  peaceful 
political  evolution  in  Russia.  He  believes  that  a  period  of  great, 
violence  is  inevitably  approaching,  since  there  is  no  hope  of 
any  spirit  of  progress  in  the  Court  or  upper  classes.  The  preach- 
ers in  the  Court  he  brands  as  men  without  principles  or  ideas, 
like  the  Vostorgov  who  has  been  mentioned,  who  is  a  leader 
in  the  organisation  that  is  preparing  the  massacres.     He  con- 


4IO  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

siders  that  the  Government's  so-called  punishments  dealt  out 
by  this  time  to  literally  millions  of  people  are  not  in  truth  punish- 
ments in  any  true  sense  of  the  term,  but  mere  revenge.  He 
feels  that  the  ministers  have  the  instincts  of  hunting  dogs,  that 
the  Government  is  not  conducting  its  persecutions  from  any 
standpoint  of  State  but  merely  as  a  war  against  an  enemy 
without  belligerent  rights.  He  feels  with  the  other  revolution- 
ists that  the  way  in  which  the  Government  is  conducting  this 
campaign  is  not  as  humane  as  ordinary  war  and  urges  that 
The  Hague  Conference  ought  to  interfere.  It  does  not  occur,  he 
says,  in  modern  countries  that  an  officer  outrages  a  captured 
girl,  as  recently  happened  in  Russia.  Petrov  knows  the  court 
and  his  indignation  is  in  proportion  to  his  knowledge.  He  looks 
gloomily  upon  the  approaching  struggle,  but  is  sure  of  the 
triumph  of  justice  in  the  end,  though  only  after  great  bloodshed. 
The  people,  he  is  confident,  will  not  recede  in  the  least  degree 
from  their  revolutionary  demands,  based  as  they  are  on  necessity. 

Father  Petrov  looks  more  hopefully  toward  the  expected 
spiritual  regeneration.  He  realises  that  at  the  present  moment 
the  Church  is  losing  adherents  every  day  on  account  of  its 
intimate  connection  with  the  infamous  Czarism,  but  as  soon  as 
the  least  elements  of  democracy  begin  to  appear  during  the 
course  of  the  coming  struggle  he  feels  that  there  will  be  a  rapid 
revolution  in  the  Church  also.  The  chief  ground  for  his  hope  is 
that  the  village  clergy  will  not  only  join  in  large  numbers  in 
the  popular  movement  but  will  even  become  martyrs  for  the 
cause.  He  feels  also  that  as  soon  as  the  least  religious  liberty 
is  offered  the  whole  mass  of  the  peasantry  will  go  over  to  the  "old 
believers,"  who  differ  from  the  Orthodox  Church  chiefly  in 
that  they  have  no  connection  with  the  State. 

He  does  not  take  so  much  interest  in  the  sects  as  he  does 
in  the  "old  believers,"  because  he  has  observed  with  Prince 
Hilkhov  that  the  members  of  the  sects  are  interesting  them- 
selves at  the  present  time  rather  in  politics  than  in  religion. 
I  agree  with  Father  Petrov  —  that  the  majority  of  the  Russian 
peasants  will  probably  only  reach  the  point  of  the  "old  believjers." 
But  I  feel  that  the  sects  are  the  most  advanced  element  of  the 
Russian  population,  though  not  the  most  numerous,  and  I 
believe  that  their  participation  in  politics  will  be  as  spiritual 


THE  RELIGIOUS  REVOLUTION  411 

as  their  religious  development  has  been  practical.  Indeed  I 
have  met  complaints  from  among  their  most  revolutionary 
members  that  the  Socialist  parties  were  not  sufficiently  imbued 
with  ideals,  but  too  much  interested  in  the  mere  questions  of 
wages  and  rents  and  elections  of  a  constitutional  assembly. 
I  believe  that  the  chief  religious  movement  and  hope  of  a 
spiritual  regeneration  in  the  near  future  lies  in  the  increasing 
spirit  of  self-assertion  of  these  sects  which  promise  a  tremendous- 
ly rapid  growth  as  soon  as  the  least  real  religious  freedom  has 
been  won  from  the  Government. 

Let  me  remind  the  reader  of  a  typical  sect,  that  natural 
product  of  the  Russian  soil,  the  Dukhobors.  To  be  sure,  trans- 
ferred to  the  strange  soil  of  Canada,  it  has  manifested  itself 
in  some  peculiar  forms,  but  in  its  original  state  in  Russia  it 
could  not  have  failed  to  inspire  any  sympathetic  observer. 
I  am  confident  that  this  is  a  type  of  faith  that  will  grow  most 
rapidly  among  the  peasants,  and  that  as  it  grows  the  economic 
and  political  movements  will  receive  a  spiritual  reinforcement 
that  will  make  finally  certain  the  victory  of  the  reigning  Socialist 
and  democratic  ideas. 

The  members  of  this  faith  cast  aside  all  ceremonies  and 
externalities.  The  only  important  dogma  of  their  belief  is  the 
justification  of  God  as  "the  spirit  of  truth."  They  recognise 
the  Trinity  but  declare  that  it  has  a  purely  spiritual  sense.  By 
"the  Mother  of  God"  they  understand  the  endless  grace  and 
bounty  of  God,  which  produces  '*  the  spirit  of  truth  "  in  ourselves, 
which  they  call  the  Son  of  God.  For  the  saving  of  the  soul  the 
belief  in  this  purely  spiritual  Christ  is  necessary,  but  a  belief 
without  deeds  is  dead.  God  lives  in  the  soul  of  man  and  He 
teaches  men  Himself.  It  is  in  us  that  Christ  must  be  bom, 
grow  up,  teach,  be  resurrected  and  carried  to  heaven.  The 
Church  and  religious  images  are  not  recognised.  The  church, 
the  Dukhobors  say,  is  in  ourselves  and  wherever  two  or  three 
men  gather  together  in  the  name  of  Christ. 

The  Dukhobors'  faith  is  their  only  law  in  their  daily  lives; 
they  apply  their  doctrines  to  their  whole  existence.  Most 
important  is  their  communal  life;  property  is  held  in  common, 
each  one  takes  for  his  family  according  to  its  recognised  needs. 
Their  refusal  to  go  in  for  military  service  is  notorious.     They 


412  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

accept  the  most  severe  and  cruel  punishments  liberally 
bestowed  on  them  by  the  Russian  Government,  or  a  whole  life- 
time in  prison,  rather  than  to  kill  their  brother  men.  War 
they  declare  to  be  murder,  contradicting  flatly  the  idea  of 
brotheriy  love. 

Such  evident  purity  of  religious  faith,  such  depth  of  social 
and  moral  principle  in  daily  life,  and  such  unconquerable  cour- 
age in  defending  their  practices,  may  prove  after  all  the  most 
insuperable  obstacle  that  the  Government  has  to  meet.  Among 
the  Dukhobors  and  related  sects  a  resistance  may  take  the  form 
of  refusal  to  participate  in  the  suppression  of  disturbances. 
Among  the  Russian  Baptists  (Stundists),  who  have  millions 
of  adherents,  it  is  already  taking  the  form  of  a  religious  warfare 
against  the  Government  as  determined  and  invincible  as  the 
religious  wars  of  the  Engh'sh  Puritans  and  Levellers  against 
the  king  and  his  church,  and  in  the  same  unconquerable  spirit 
with  which  the  Tyrolese  Catholics  or  the  Swiss  Protestants 
defended  their  homes  against  their  religious  foes.  The  Czarism 
has  conquered  the  bodies  of  its  subjects;  we  doubt  if  it  will  ever 
be  able  to  conquer  their  souls. 


CHAPTER   VII 

THE    RUSSIAN    REVOLUTION 

In  new  song  the  old  note  of  mournful  meditation  was  absent.  It 
was  not  the  utterance  of  a  soul  wandering  in  solitude  along  the  dark 
paths  of  melancholy  perplexity,  of  a  soul  beaten  down  by  want,  burdened 
with  fear,  deprived  of  individuality  and  colourless.  It  breathed  no  sighs 
of  a  strength  hungering  for  space ;  it  shouted  no  provoking  cries  of  irritated 
courage  ready  to  crush  both  the  good  and  the  bad  indiscriminately.  It 
did  not  voice  the  striving  elemental  of  the  animal  "instinct"  for  freedom, 
for  freedom's  sake,  nor  the  freedom  of  wrong  or  vengeance  capable  of 
destroying  everything  and  powerless  to  build  up  anything.  In  this 
song  there  was  nothing  from  the  old,  slavish  world. 

It  floated  along  directly,  evenly;  it  proclaimed  an  iron  virility;  a  calm 
threat.  Simple  and  clear,  it  swept  the  people  after  it  along  an  endless 
path  leading  to  the  far  distant  future;  and  it  spoke  frankly  of  the  hard- 
ships of  the  way. — Maxim  Gorky,  Foma  Gordeeff. 


THE  struggle  in  which  Russia  is  engaged  is  so  desperate,  the 
brave  and  intelligent  people  are  at  present  so  helpless,  that 
the  foreigner  is  almost  incapable  of  grasping  the  full  tragedy  of 
the  situation.  We  moderns  can  conceive  tragedies  of  the  in- 
dividual. We  are  not  accustomed  to  tragedies  in  which  whole 
peoples  are  the  heroes.  In  Russia  a  single  class  of  men,  put  by 
circumstances  in  entire  control  of  the  destinies  of  the  nation, 
has  become  so  cold,  so  false,  so  dulled  to  all  its  higher  inter- 
ests, that  our  minds  refuse  to  credit  their  actions.  In  other 
countries  we  do  not  have  a  ruling  class  with  such  utterly  irre- 
sponsible power,  and  we  have  almost  forgotten  the  depth  of  evil 
that  still  remains  in  mankind.  Russia's  rulers  are  to  all  appear- 
ances modem  educated  men  that  would  pass  anywhere  for  good 
Europeans  or  Americans,  but  they  have  been  given  a  mastery 
over  others,  a  right  to  govern  others  without  their  consent,  and 
through  this  they  have  become  like  the  tyrants  of  old. 

413 


414  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

"The  debauched,  idle  and  blas^  men  that  compose  the  govern- 
ing classes  generally,"  says  Tolstoi,  "must  find  some  goal  for 
their  existence,  but  this  goal  can  only  be  the  increase  of  their 
own  glory.  In  all  other  passions  the  point  of  satiety  is  soon 
reached;  only  the  passion  for  glory  is  unlimited."  We  have 
forgotten  that  it  is  a  law  of  all  history  that  men  in  a  false 
position  of  power  are  bound  to  degenerate,  that  no  man  is  good 
enough  to  govern  another  against  the  other's  consent,  and  if 
he  does  so  that  he  is  bound  to  bring  about  both  his  own  and 
that  other's  ruin.  Unless  we  seize  again  this  principle  which 
lies  at  the  bottom  of  all  social  life,  we  cannot  hope  to  grasp 
one  iota  of  the  awful  tragedy  that  faces  the  Russian  people 
at  the  present  moment. 

It  is  just  because  its  spiritual  life  has  been  deepened  and 
intensified  by  great  experience  in  the  suffering  of  the  whole 
nation,  that  Russia's  message  is  able  to  stir  the  other  countries; 
happier  lands  less  experienced,  living  more  superficially,  have 
had  no  such  insights  into  the  evil  that  still  lies  buried  in  man, 
into  the  horrors  that  can  be  perpetrated  in  the  present  state 
of  society,  and  into  the  heroic  capacities  that  lie  latent  in  us  to 
enable  us  to  fight  even  without  success  against  a  world  of  evil. 
It  is  not  another  society  that  Russians  are  learning  to  under- 
stand through  suffering,  but  our  own.  We  know  capitalism,  of 
soulless  corporations  that  rob  consumers,  starve  employees  and 
corrupt  the  State.  Russia  knows  that  this  same  capitalism 
gives  the  Czar  the  money  to  build  prisons  for  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  his  people,  to  buy  the  rifles  and  machine  guns  of  the 
Cossacks  and  to  hire  an  army  of  thugs  —  knows  that  this  same 
capitalism  is  as  ready  to  take  profits  directly  from  murder  and 
plunder  supported  by  murder  as  it  is  to  grow  rich  through 
bought  corporations,  lawyers  or  legislators. 

The  Russian  people  have  reasoned  it  out  that  modem  capital- 
ism will  stop  at  no  wrong,  even  that  of  the  murder  of  whole 
peoples  —  they  have  experienced  this  illuminating  truth  in 
their  own  flesh  and  blood.  They  know  that  each  individual 
capitalist  has  doubtless  this  or  that  moral  code  for  his  private 
life,  but  they  know  that  the  capitalists,  all  bound  together  by 
the  bond  of  international  finance,  are  ready  to  murder  all  man- 
kind and  secure  higher  interest  rate.     So  there  has  been  planted 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  415 

in  Russians  heart  a  great  and  ennobling  hatred ;  not  a  hatred  of 
persons  but  of  a  system,  a  hatred  raised  to  great  social  princi- 
ples and  ideas.  Hatred  against  men  brings  the  world  no  mes- 
sage. Such  of  Russia's  victims  as  have  been  killed  in  a  war  of 
mere  mutual  hate,  however  just  the  cause  for  which  they  have 
died,  however  honoured  by  their  companions  in  arms,  will  never 
be  viewed  by  the  world  as  mankind's  martyrs,  as  world-heroes 
who  "when  we  are  born  are  straight  our  friends."  Russia's 
martyrs  have  often  died  with  their  hearts  filled  with  love  not 
hatred,  not  for  a  party  merely  or  even  for  a  nation,  but  quite 
consciously  for  all  mankind. 

They  died  as  victims  of  that  capitalism  which  oppresses 
the  whole  race.  Like  the  early  Christians  they  died  for  the 
emancipation  of  humanity.  Some,  it  is  true,  seek  first  a  mate- 
rial emancipation  for  their  fellow  men,  putting  things  spiritual 
in  a  second  place;  others  merit  Tolstoi's  accusation  that  though 
sincere,  they  have  an  egotistic  passion  for  leadership  in  the 
new  cause;  but  most  of  those  who  go  gladly  to  prison  and  exile 
and  death  go  for  the  spiritual  elevation  of  the  races,  for  the 
ideal  of  a  better  society  that  is  to  produce  better  types  of 
individuals  than  the  world  has  yet  seen. 

II 

The  Russian  people  had  already  won  their  battle  against  the 
Czarism  when  the  foreigners  interfered  and  threw  in  their 
forces  with  those  of  the  Czar  —  lending  him  1,000,000,000  rubles, 
satisfied  with  7  per  cent,  interest  and  making  no  conditions 
for  what  murderous  purposes  the  money  was  to  be  employed. 

The  battle  was  won  when  the  Czar  was  allowed  to  reach  his 
hands  into  the  vast  treasury  house  of  the  international  capital  — 
and  now,  until  he  is  cut  off  from  the  colossal  subsidies  that  en- 
able him  to  continue  his  murderous  Government,  the  situation 
is  desperate  indeed.  Cases  are  common  in  which  despots 
have  allied  themselves  with  foreign  powers.  But  this  is  new  — 
this  is  the  unique  instance  of  all  history,  when  foreign  powers 
have  each  contributed  something  to  support  the  oppressive 
government.  There  is  hardly  an  important  banking  interest 
in  France  or  Germany  that  has  not  contributed  something  to 


41 6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  Czar's  murder  funds,  and  scarcely  a  prominent  capitalistic 
institution  of  Austria  and  England  that  is  not  indirectly  con- 
nected with  it.     Even  America  was  tainted  a  few  years  ago. 

The  Russian  people,  I  say,  had  won  their  struggle  at  the 
time  of  the  first  Duma  when  the  foreign  capitalists  loaned 
1,000,000,000  rubles  to  the  despotic  Government,  pretending  to 
assume  that  they  thought  the  Czarism  was  becoming  constitu- 
tional, but  really  well  aware  that  it  was  absolutely  irresponsible 
toward  the  people.  The  European  military  situation  was 
only  a  part  of  the  cause  of  this  monstrous  international  pride. 
France  and  Germany,  overloaded  with  military  burdens  and 
forced  to  subordinate  their  greatest  social  reforms  to  military 
necessities,  are  entirely  depending  on  the  position  toward  the 
other  nations  taken  by  the  Czar's  criminal  Government.  Before 
the  last  loan  the  immense  sums  of  gold  secured  from  France 
to  make  possible  the  perpetuation  of  the  Czarism,  were  obtained 
largely  on  the  ground  that  the  money  would  go  to  supply  arms 
to  an  enemy  of  Germany.  The  new  crushing  tax  burdens  for 
the  rebuilding  of  the  navy  destroyed  by  the  Japanese  —  bur- 
dens which  make  impossible  any  genuine  reform  inside  of  Russia 
in  the  near  future  —  were  levied  to  please  the  Czar's  cousin, 
William  11.  of  Germany,  who  wants  to  see  another  European 
fleet  that  might  be  used  in  an  emergency  against  his  rival,  Eng- 
land. As  long  as  the  Russian  Government  remains  despotic 
and  half  independent,  it  will  engage,  like  every  other  despotism, 
in  aggressive  enterprises  of  one  kind  or  another,  if  not  in  Turkey 
in  Japan,  if  not  in  Japan  then  by  pledging  its  army  to  this  or 
the  other  power  as  mercenary  troops.  The  last  monster  loan 
also  was  in  part  a  sale  of  Russia's  organised  forces  for  murder. 
It  will  be  remembered  that  large  contributors  to  this  loan, 
besides  France,  were  also  Austria  and  England,  and  other  coun- 
tries. In  return  for  these  immense  sums  the  Russian  Govern- 
ment, it  appears,  promised  the  world  to  work  against  Germany 
in  the  cause  of  international  peace ;  it  was  a  sort  of  international 
blackmail. 

But  the  murderous  Czarism  probably  gets  more  of  the  money 
of  the  international  bankers  by  selling  the  natural  resources 
of  the  impoverished  country  in  the  form  of  industrial  privileges 
granted  by  the  Government,  or  by  means  of  high  rates  of  inter- 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  417 

est  squeezed  from  the  starving  population,  than  it  does  as  pay 
for  its  mercenary  army. 

For  many  years  English,  Belgian,  and  German  money,  as  well 
as  French,  has  been  pouring  into  Russia's  industries  under  the 
tutelage  of  the  State,  until  the  country  is  rapidly  becoming  like 
India,  Egypt,  Turkey  or  Persia,  with  both  the  Government 
and  industries  largely  in  the  hands  of  foreign  financiers. 
Already  leading  conservatives  even  have  spoken  of  Russia's 
real  parliament,  the  international  bankers.  There  is  a  decided 
danger,  indeed,  that  the  country  may  in  the  not  distant  future 
become  a  sort  of  international  protectorate,  like  China  —  unless 
in  the  meanwhile  the  Czarism  is  overturned. 

The  Russian  people,  in  resisting  the  alliance  between  the 
foreign  financiers  and  its  Government,  are  fighting  to  prevent 
another  effort  of  international  capital  to  still  further  strengthen 
itself,  to  enlarge  the  territory  of  its  "colonies"  or  "subject 
races,"  and  by  means  of  its  vast  income  so  secured  to  further 
corrupt    the    world's    governments    and   maintain  its  power. 

The  Russian  fight  is  in  this  sense  a  world  fight  indeed,  but 
it  is  also  a  world  movement  in  a  more  direct  and  much  more 
spiritual  meaning.  It  is  a  world  struggle  for  modem  or  social 
democracy.  The  Russian  movement  is  the  only  revolutionary 
movement  of  a  whole  people  in  our  times.  Russia  is  therefore 
the  only  country  where,  under  the  guidance  of  the  best  knowl- 
edge and  the  highest  ideals  of  our  period,  a  new  foimdation  is  \ 
being  laid  for  the  democracy  of  the  future. 

For  whenever  democracy  has  taken  deep  and  permanent  root 
it  owes  its  first  beginning  to  revolution,  to  open  violent  re- 
bellion. This  is  notoriously  true  of  France;  it  is  true  of  Eng- 
land ;  it  is  true  of  the  United  States.  That  country  which  has 
had  no  revolution  has  had  no  real  democracy.  Many  per- 
sons look  at  modern  Prussia,  where  there  has  been  no  revolu- 
tion, as  possessing  a  semi-democratic  government.  Let  such 
persons  recall  the  principle  of  Bismarck  when,  as  recently  as 
1863,  he  governed  the  country  without  the  consent  of  the  Land- 
tag as  it  was  governed  centuries  ago.  There  has  been  a  con- 
stitutional deadlock,  and  as  there  has  never  been  a  revolution 
to  put  an  end  once  and  for  all  to  the  last  vestiges  of  the  old 
autocratic  system,  Bismarck  could  very  reasonably  claim  that 


4i8  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

in  such  cases  when  the  new  laws  did  not  work  it  was  necessary 
to  return  to  the  old.  When  the  constitution  fails  to  work  in 
the  United  States  the  reactionary  forces  cannot  turn  back  to 
the  laws  of  George  III.,  because  the  United  States  has  had  a 
revolution;  nor  do  English  judges  revert  in  political  questions 
to  English  institutions  before  1688,  nor  the  French  to  laws  that 
existed  before  1789.  In  these  countries  revolutions  have  cut 
off  the  line  of  retreat  of  reactionary  forces.  In  every  great  con- 
test between  reaction  and  progress,  then,  progress  has  the 
advantage,  for  reaction  can  only  obtain  a  foothold  by  basing 
its  claims  on  the  barbarities  of  the  past.  In  supporting  a 
profound  revolutionary  movement,  then,  the  Russian  people 
are  laying  the  only  possible  basis  for  a  new  democracy.  This 
democracy,  struggling  into  being  to-day,  must  be  based  on  the 
world  conditions  of  the  present  moment.  It  is  evident  that  the 
problem  before  any  great  revolutionary  movement  in  our  time 
will  be  the  great  problem  of  the  age  —  the  social  problem. 

Ill 

A  revolutionary  social  movement  in  any  one  nation  would 
be  rich  in  lessons  for  every  other.  But  the  only  countries  that 
can  really  advance  new  and  great  solutions  are  the  large  coun- 
tries —  those  that  are  powerful  enough  to  be  independent,  that 
embrace  such  a  variety  of  conditions  and  of  peoples  that  their 
solution  may  be  of  a  universal  application.  It  is  evident  that 
countries  like  Germany  or  France,  the  slaves  of  constant  ter- 
ror of  destructive  war,  or  Great  Britain,  oppressed  by  the  night- 
mare that  one  day  she  may  be  reduced  to  poverty  by  the  loss  of 
her  control  of  the  ocean,  are  not  entirely  free  to  undertake 
solutions  of  great  social  problems;  they  must  give  the  first 
place  in  the  policies  of  State  and  the  expenditure  of  public 
money  to  problems  of  national  defence.  Russia,  on  the  other 
hand,  has  long  ago  lost  all  terror  of  becoming  a  province  of  some 
other  nation,  just  as  the  United  States  is  under  no  necessity 
of  maintaining  either  a  large  land  force  or  a  navy  of  the  size 
of  Great  Britain's. 

Russia,  like  the  United  States,  is  a  self-sufficient  country; 
more  than  a  coimtry ,  a  world.     Like  the  new  world,  the  Russian. 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  419 

world  forms  an  almost  complete  economic  whole,  embracing 
tmder  a  single  government  nearly  all,  if  not  all,  climates  and 
nearly  all  the  raw  products  used  in  modem  life ;  both  countries 
are  large  exporters  of  agricultural  products,  both  are  devoted 
more  to  agriculture  than  to  manufacturing  industry.  Both 
of  these  worlds  are  composed  largely  of  newly  acquired  and 
newly  settled  territory;  though  both  are  inhabited  by  very 
many  races,  in  each  a  single  race  prevails  numerically  and  in 
most  other  respects  over  all  the  rest,  and  keeps  them  together 
as  a  single  whole.  As  the  result  of  the  mixture  of  races  and  the 
recent  settlement  of  large  parts  of  both  countries,  their  culture 
is  international,  world-culture,  unmarked  by  the  comparatively 
provincial  nationalistic  tendencies  of  England,  Germany,  or 
France.  We  may  look,  according  to  a  great  German  publicist, 
Kautsky,  to  America  for  the  great  economic  experiments  of  the 
near  future  and  to  Russia  for  the  new  (social)  politics. 

America  is  essentially  a  country  of  rapid  economic  evolu- 
tion, while  Russia  is  undeveloped,  economically  and  financially 
dependent.  America  is  the  country  of  economic  genius,  a  nation 
whose  conceptions  of  material  development  have  reached  even 
a  spiritual  height.  The  great  American  qualities,  the  American 
virtues,  the  American  imagination,  have  thrown  themselves 
almost  wholly  into  business,  the  material  development  of  the 
country.  Americans  are  the  first  of  modem  peoples  that  have 
learned  to  respect  the  repeated  failures  of  enterprising  individuals 
with  a  genius  for  affairs,  knowing  that  such  failures  often 
lead  to  greater  heights  of  success.  They  have  learned  how  to 
excuse  enormous  waste  when  it  was  made  for  the  sake  of  econo- 
mies lying  in  the  distant  future.  They  can  appreciate  the 
enterprise  of  persons  who,  instead  of  immediately  exploiting 
their  properties,  know  how  to  wait,  like  some  of  our  most  able 
builders  that,  foreseeing  the  brilliant  future  of  the  locality  in 
which  they  are  situated,  are  satisfied  with  temporary  structures 
and  poor  incomes  until  the  time  is  ripe  for  some  of  the  magni- 
ficent modem  achievements  in  architecture,  in  which  we  so 
clearly  lead.  All  three  of  these  types  of  men  we  admire  are  true 
revolutionists,  who  prefer  to  wait,  to  waste,  or  to  fail,  rather 
than  to  accept  the  lesser  for  the  greater  good. 

So  it  is  with  Russians  in  their  politics.     There  seems  no 


420  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

reason  for  doubting  that  the  near  future  will  show  that  the 
political  failures  now  being  made  by  the  Russians  are  the 
failures  of  political  genius,  that  the  waste  of  lives  and  property 
will  be  repaid  later  a  hundredfold,  and  that  the  hopeful  and 
planful  patience  with  which  the  Russians  are  looking  forward 
and  working  to  a  great  social  transformation  promises  the 
greatest  and  most  magnificent  results  when  that  transforma- 
tion is  achieved.  Already  the  political  revolution  of  the 
Russian  people,  though  not  yet  embodied  in  political  institu- 
tions, is  becoming  as  rapid,  as  remarkable,  as  phenomenal, 
as  the  economic  revolution  of  the  United  States. 

IV 

As  the  Russians  have  to  contend  with  world  forces  and  are 
bringing  about  world  results,  it  is  no  ordinary  war  or  revolution 
in  which  they  have  engaged  themselves.  Already  it  has  become 
a  part  of  the  social  struggle  of  all  Europe ;  if  it  lasts  many  years 
it  must  ultimately  become  a  part  of  some  future  world  upheaval 
of  unprecedented  magnitude,  of  new  and  widespread  world 
revolutions  and  world  wars.  We  are  not  so  likely  to  deny  the 
possibility  that  such  events  as  the  French  Revolution  and 
the  world  wars  which  accompanied  it  may  occur  again,  as  to 
be  misled  by  a  too  close  comparison  between  the  present  situa- 
tion and  that  of  1789.  Considered  even  as  a  world  movement 
the  French  Revolution  was  a  success,  but  it  was  also  a  failure, 
so  it  has  come  about  that  whenever  we  hear  of  revolutions  we 
hear  also  of  the  inevitable  "reaction  that  must  follow  revolu- 
tion," and  of  the  avenging  "man  on  horseback." 

Certainly  there  was  a  reaction  in  Europe  soon  after  1800; 
certainly  Napoleon  was  of  all  men  that  ever  lived  the  man  on 
horseback.  But  were  this  reaction  and  this  man  on  horse- 
back results  of  the  French  Revolution?  To  answer  this  ques- 
tion we  must  first  divide  the  revolution  into  two  parts  —  the 
true  revolution,  the  movement  that  embraced  the  whole  of  the 
nation,  that  resulted  in  the  final  overthrow  of  feudalispi  in 
France,  and  led  to  the  calling  of  the  Constitutional  Assembly. 
In  contrast  to  this  we  have  the  later  Insurrection  of  Paris  which 
resulted  in  the  execution  of  the  king  —  a  measure  by  no  means 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  421 

approved  of  by  the  whole  nation  —  and  in  the  capture  of  the 
Legislative  Assembly  by  the  mob  of  Paris  with  the  assistance 
of  a  few  regiments  of  professional  soldiers.  Moreover,  the  Paris 
of  1792  was  in  a  sense  the  tyrant  over  the  nation.  Modem 
capitals  have  no  such  power  as  did  Paris  then.  It  was  this 
insurrection  that  produced  the  reign  of  terror  and  led  ultimately 
to  the  inevitable  reaction,  not  against  the  revolution,  but 
against  the  insurrection. 

The  insurrection  of  Paris  in  1792,  not  the  Revolution  of 
France  in  1789,  produced  the  terror  —  a  reign  of  violence  not 
against  the  Government,  not  from  below,  but  by  the  Govern- 
ment itself  against  the  captives  in  its  power.  There  has  been 
no  single  important  example  of  such  mob  violence  in  Russia. 
The  so-called  "terror"  does  not  consist  in  the  execution  by 
revolutionists,  without  risk  to  themselves,  of  persons  within 
their  power,  but  of  heroic  attacks  on  murderous  officials  that 
hold  the  community  by  the  throat,  attacks  which  almost 
always  result  in  the  instant  death  or  execution  of  the  revolu- 
tionists. Every  political  party  in  Russia  is  even  opposed  to 
capital  punishment,  not  only  for  political  but  even  for  ordinary 
crimes.  The  Russian  nation,  far  from  being  led  to  any  reaction 
by  terroristic  deeds,  looks  at  these  executioners  of  the  popular 
will  as  national  heroes  and  martyrs  in  the  same  sense  as  were 
the  early  Christians  that  braved  the  wrath  of  Nero  or  Domitian. 

There  was,  however,  an  international  reaction  against  the 
French  Revolution  that  put  the  nation  under  the  necessity  of 
granting  military  powers  to  Napoleon,  that  robbed  the  French 
people  of  a  part  of  the  victories  they  had  won,  and  that  long 
supported  a  reactionary  government  in  the  country  itself. 
Napoleon  would  never  have  been  created  had  it  not  been  for 
the  reactionary  attacks  of  all  the  foreign  powers  of  Europe  on 
Republican  France;  he  would  never  have  been  entrusted  with 
the  powers  of  a  despot  if  France  had  not  been  under  the  desperate 
necessity  of  fighting  a  life  and  death  battle  for  her  very  exis- 
tence. It  is  literally  true  that  England,  Russia,  Austria,  and 
Prussia  placed  Napoleon  on  the  throne  and  that  they  kept  there 
one  king  or  another  for  more  than  a  generation  afterward. 
Even  Napoleon  III.  would  have  had  no  success  in  appealing  to 
the  imperialistic  instincts  of  the  country  if  it  had  not  been  for  the 


422  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

general  movement  and  reaction  of  Prussia,  Russia,  and  Austria, 
a  sort  of  renewal  of  the  Holy  Alliance  after  1848. 

The  reactionary  countries  of  Europe  were  able  to  plant  their 
despotic  autocracies  in  France  after  the  revolution  because, 
leagued  together,  they  were  far  more  powerful  than  that  nation. 
There  are  still  reactionary  countries  in  Europe.  As  we  have 
shown,  the  Prussian  Government  is  in  some  respects  even  behind 
her  Russian  neighbour.  But  the  other  nations  of  the  world 
to-day,  especially  France,  England,  and  the  United  States,  will 
by  no  means  be  so  far  behind  democratic  Russia  as  the  monar- 
chies at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  were  behind  France. 
There  is  no  power  than  can  force  the  Russian  people  in  self- 
defence  to  rely  on  a  man  on  horseback.  Nor  is  there  any  tendency 
amongst  the  Russians  themselves  to  worship  individuals  to 
the  exclusion  of  great  principles.  France  had  had  the  evil 
example  of  a  feudalistic  Catholic  Church  and  its  infallible  pope. 
In  Russia  there  is  no  pope  and  the  Church  has  no  prestige 
among  the  people.  France  had  been  engaged  in  wars  with 
her  neighbours  uninterruptedly  for  many  generations;  to  a 
certain  degree  she  had  learned  the  military  spirit  that  could 
be  used  by  Napoleon  and  the  foreign  oppressors.  Russia  has 
long  ceased  to  expand  territorially,  and  she  possesses  such  a 
large  part  of  the  surface  of  the  earth  that  the  keenest  ambition 
of  her  people  is  rather  to  hold  and  develop  what  they  have  than 
to  gain  more.  Nowhere  are  the  masses  of  the  population  so 
pacific  as  in  Russia.  Let  us,  then,  not  judge  the  Russian  Revolu- 
tion by  the  French.  The  reaction  in  France  and  the  coming 
of  Napoleon  are  both  explained  by  the  special  conditions  of  the 
world  at  the  time,  and  none  of  these  conditions  exist  to-day. 

In  France,  as  in  Russia,  the  more  prosperous  and  privi- 
leged part  of  the  middle  classes,  at  first  enthusiastic  revolu- 
tionists, soon  left  the  movement,  but  in  neither  coimtry  has 
this  desertion  been  great  enough  to  create  a  reaction.  Carlyle 
shows  how  constitutionalism  in  France  "in  sorrow  and  anger" 
demanded  martial  law  against  the  revolutionists  and  obtained 
it,  an  act  that  soon  may  be  expected  from  the  majority  of  the 
Russian  constitutionalists  and  that  is  already  supported  by 
a  large  minority.  This  step,  says  the  great  historian,  can  be 
justified  on  one  premise  only  —  that  **  constitutionalism  is  of 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  423 

God  and  mob  assembling  the  devil,  otherwise  it  is  not  so  just." 
Like  the  Russian  Constitutional  Democrats,  the  august  National 
Assembly,  according  to  Carlyle,  never  really  wanted  riot.  "All 
it  ever  wanted  was  riot  enough  to  balance  court  plotting." 
In  Russia,  as  in  France,  the  people  very  soon  learned  the  worth- 
lessness  of  their  moderate  constitutionalist  allies.  "To  them 
it  was  clear,"  writes  Carlyle,  "that  Philosophism  has  baked  no 
bread;  that  Patriot  Committee  men  will  level  down  to  their 
own  level,  and  no  lower." 

The  Russian  moderates  have  not  carried  with  them  in  their 
retreat  even  as  large  a  part  of  the  population  as  did  the  French. 
Nearly  all  the  unions  of  the  professional  classes  which  at  first 
allowed  themselves  to  be  used  by  the  President  of  the  Union  of 
Unions,  Professor  Milyoukov,  for  the  purposes  of  the  Constitu- 
tional Democratic  Party,  have  cast  this  organisation  off.  From 
the  first  most  of  them  refused  to  throw  their  weight  in  for  any 
lesser  measure  than  an  assembly  elected  by  an  equal  suffrage, 
while  such  as  temporarily  joined  the  moderate  party  have  left 
in  large  nimibers. 


From  the  very  first  the  intellectual  leaders  of  the  Russian 
people  have  been  opposed  heart  and  soul  to  the  Czarism,  and 
there  is  hardly  one  name  of  the  first  rank  from  the  beginning 
that  has  not  made  every  sacrifice,  even  to  suffering  imprison- 
ment, exile,  and  death,  in  the  struggle  against  it.  Over  a  century 
ago  Novikov,  who  foimded  the  first  newspaper  and  publishing 
house  of  importance  and  established  scholarships  and  libraries 
all  over  the  country,  was  imprisoned  by  Catharine  II.  until  his 
death.  Roditchev  was  similarly  persecuted  by  the  same 
monarch.  Catharine  said  of  him,  "  He  is  spreading  the  French 
plague  (the  Revolution),  he  is  a  rebel  worse  than  Pugatchev, 
he  praises  Franklin.*'  These  were  among  the  founders  of  Rus- 
sian literature,  since  educated  persons  before  this  time  wrote 
and  even  spoke  almost  exclusively  in  French.  I  need  barely 
mention  the  later  writers  whose  works  and  persecutions  are 
known  to  everybody:  Pushkin,  Turgeniev,  Gogol,  Tcher- 
nechevsky,  Dostoievsky,  Tolstoi,  Korolenko  and  Gorky,  there 


424  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

are  also  a  dozen  others  equally  well  known  to  Russians  as  these, 
who  have  suffered  as  much. 

Since  the  last  generation  educated  and  refined  women  have 
taken  the  same  part  in  the  movement  as  the  men ;  in  fact,  they 
have  been  even  more  high-spirited,  devoted,  and  consistent. 
It  is  not  that  the  equality  of  women  is  a  special  feature  of  Rus- 
sian civilisation,  for  Russian  women  until  the  emancipation 
movement  had  been  perhaps  even  less  prominent  in  literature, 
politics,  and  affairs  than  had  the  women  of  some  other  countries. 
It  is  that  there  began  in  Russia  a  generation  ago  the  first  life 
and  death  struggle  of  a  nation,  carried  out  on  the  very  highest 
social  principles.  Into  this  struggle  women  plunged  from  the 
very  outset  and  they  have  furnished  a  very  considerable  part 
of  the  martyrs  to  the  cause.  In  the  revolutionary  movement 
of  the  '80s,  in  some  of  the  big  trials,  often  a  fourth  or  a  fifth 
of  the  prisoners  were  women  of  the  educated  and  noble  classes. 
Several  of  these  women  who  have  spent  fifteen  or  twenty  years 
in  exile  or  solitary  confinement  have  rejoined  the  revolutionary 
movement.  Still  more  important,  they  and  less  active  friends 
and  admirers  who  were  legion,  have  taught  their  children  either 
to  look  up  to  or  respect  the  revolutionists.  As  Russian  children 
are  already  without  any  inbred  love  of  the  State  or  Church, 
they  are  ripe  for  the  most  complete  sacrifices  for  the  revolutionary 
movement. 

I  cannot  even  sum  up  the  wholesale  sacrifice  made  by  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  of  the  young  men  and  women  students  of 
Russia  for  the  social  liberty  and  equality  of  the  whole  Russian 
people  and  for  Socialism  the  world  over.  I  will  only  deny  the 
reports  that  are  being  spread  that  there  is  any  relaxation  of  this 
movement.  It  has  been  said  that  a  certain  part  of  the  students 
are  becoming  less  revolutionary,  that  the  Government  has  been 
able  to  terrorise  another  part  into  submission.  Both  state- 
ments are  entirely  false.  If  the  proportion  of  timid  or  naturally 
conservative  students  in  the  universities  has  somewhat  increased, 
it  is  because  tens  of  thousands  of  the  brave  are  languishing  in 
prison  or  exile.  This  year  already  the  majority  of  the  leading 
universities  of  Russia  have  been  closed  again  on  account  of 
revolutionary  student  disturbances.  A  reactionary  paper 
recently  reported  with  glee  the  reopening  of  one  of  them  —  the 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  42$ 

picture  it  drew  of  the  reopening  is  sufficient  to  show  its  true 
significance:  "The  University  is  again  open.  At  the  doors 
there  are  standing  policemen  and  sentinels  with  loaded  guns; 
inside  of  the  University  is  a  company  of  soldiers  and  a  large 
squad  of  police.  The  students  have  to  show  tickets  on  going 
in  and  to  have  them  marked.  The  lectures  are  going  regularly 
forward.  It  is  to  be  noticed  that  there  is  no  tearing  about  in 
the  corridors,  with  cries,  noises,  and  alarms,  with  the  caps  on 
the  head.  The  strong  measures  have  forced  order.  The 
revolutionists  are  foaming  with  rage."  Let  us  not  leave  the 
picture  without  recalling  the  misery  of  these  students  who  give 
up  everything,  present  opportunities,  their  freedom,  and  their 
future  careers,  for  the  cause,  who  go  about  in  the  university 
towns  in  the  terrible  Russian  winters  without  warm  overcoats^ 
who  are  ready  to  accept  any  sort  of  old  clothes  from  anyone 
sufficiently  sympathetic  with  the  revolutionary  movement  to 
donate  them  in  the  name  of  the  cause,  who  earn  their  living 
by  any  means,  from  shaving  to  giving  lessons  for  two  or  three 
rubles  a  month. 

There  can  be  no  question  that  the  overwhelming  majority 
of  the  educated  class  of  Russia  are  devoted  heart  and  soul  to 
the  revolution.  This  is  not  an  accident;  it  is  not  due  to  any 
particular  element  of  the  moment,  nor  perhaps  even  to  the  poli- 
tical situation  of  Russia  in  general.  The  Russian  educated 
man  is  not  bourgeois  like  those  of  other  countries.  His 
character  has  never  been  drawn  better  in  a  few  words  than  by 
Merejkovsky,  one  of  Russia's  most  brilliant  writers,  whose 
works  are  being  translated  to-day  into  every  language.  "  Recall,'* 
he  says,  "the  figures  of  Rasbolnikov,  Bazarov,  Karamazov 
(perhaps  the  three  most  famous  characters  of  Russian  litera- 
ture). What  strange  characters!  You  can  call  these  men 
what  you  like;  they  are  not  bourgeois.  In  their  presence 
Flaubert  would  not  have  dared  to  say  that  politics  is  the  busi- 
ness of  the  mob.  For  them  politics  are  a  passion,  an  intoxica- 
tion, a  devouring  flame.  They  are  heroes  and  martyrs  who 
leave  of  their  own  free  will  the  camp  of  the  successful  to  go  into 
the  camp  of  the  dying." 

The  character  of  nations,  like  that  of  individuals,  can  be 
made  great  by  tragic  experience.     Some  of  our  modem  countries 


426  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

are  so  far  from  such  calamities  and  deep  experiences  that  they 
have  forgotten  what  can  be  learned  from  misery  and  suffer- 
ing. The  Russian  people  are  losing  much  of  their  vital  forces  and 
even  something  in  certain  elements  of  character  by  the  struggle, 
but  they  are  gaining  more  than  they  lose.  Every  year  sees 
an  astounding  and  inspiring  increase  of  the  intelligence  and 
seriousness  of  all  classes  of  the  people.  There  is,  for  instance, 
little  tendency  to  patronise  light  and  superficial  literature  and 
plays,  to  look  at  great  situations  in  a  superficial  or  comic  man- 
ner, to  idealise  the  brutal  and  ugly  forces  of  life  because  we  are 
on  the  whole  satisfied  with  our  present  state.  The  nation  is 
becoming  refined,  chastened,  elevated  and  ennobled  by  the 
indomitable  struggle  it  is  making  for  great  and  pure  ideas. 

Under  the  leadership  and  guidance  of  men  devoted  to  great 
causes,  the  Russian  people  is  surely  awaited  by  a  greater  destiny 
than  is  so  far  known  to  history.  All  the  best  writers  of  the 
•country,  read  as  no  others  perhaps  by  the  whole  civilised  world, 
are  trying  to  express  the  message  that  this  heroic  and  devoted 
people  are  sending  to  humanity.  It  will  only  be  after  the 
-climax  of  the  great  revolution  that  we  shall  know  definitely 
what  this  message  is.  In  the  meanwhile  that  which  lends  most 
of  all  an  absorbing  and  irresistible  interest  to  the  Russian 
revolution  is  the  dim  foreshadowing  of  large  ideas.  Whoever 
tries  to  peer  even  a  little  way  into  the  future  must  make  his 
essay  at  a  characterisation  of  the  Russian  message.  Certainly 
its  import  to  humanity  does  not  promise  to  be  inferior  to 
the  message  of  Rousseau  and  Voltaire,  and  we  should  not  be 
surprised  to  find  one  day  that  the  world  has  been  more  affected 
by  the  Russian  revolution  than  it  has  by  any  of  the  great  world 
transformations  that  have  taken  place  since  the  fall  of  the 
Roman  Empire  and  the  general  adoption  of  Christianity  by  the 
European  people. 

For  Russia  it  seems  to  be  at  once  a  revolution,  a  refor- 
mation, and  a  renaissance.  To  the  world  it  may  be  the  begin- 
ning of  a  still  greater  change.  For  Rome  the  adoption  of 
Christianity  was  a  profound  transformation  in  the  Church  and 
State,  for  civilisation  it  was  the  reversal  of  the  aims  and  ideas 
that  had  guided  it  for  a  thousand  years.  A  conscious  social 
revolution  victorious  in  Russia  might  set  in  motion  an  untold 


THE  RUSSIAN  REVOLUTION  427 

world- change  in  both  the  organisation  of  society  and  the  ruling 
ideas  and  aims  of  mankind. 

"Christian  himianity  —  if  not  all  humanity,"  says  Tolstoi, 
"is  at  present  at  the  beginning  of  a  universal  transformation 
that  has  been  smouldering  during  centuries,  even  thousands  of 
years." 

What  is  this  transformation?     What  is  Russia's  message? 


CHAPTER  VIII 

Russia's  message 


THE  Russian  revolution  is  an  heir  to  the  ages.  It  is 
descended  in  part  from  primitive  Christianity  and  partly 
from  the  Reformation,  but  its  immediate  predecessor  was  the 
French  Revolution.  The  first  Russian  revolutionists,  the 
Decembrists  of  1825,  received  their  ideas  and  inspiration  directly 
from  France  itself.  Both  Russia's  great  religious  Socialist, 
Tolstoi,  and  its  new  political  Socialism,  are  deeply  indebted 
to  the  French  Revolution  and  its  thinker,  Rousseau.  In  the 
last  generation  many  liberal  and  educated  Russians  have  been 
brought  up  from  the  cradle  on  the  pure  and  noble  democracy 
of  Rousseau.  For  more  than  a  generation  the  "Nouvelle 
Heloise,"  "Emile,"  and  the  "Contrat  Social,"  were  the  source 
of  social  inspiration  not  only  to  France  and  Russia,  but  to  the 
world.  In  France  they  were  gospels  —  as  Carlyle  had  said, 
"the  Evangel  according  to  St.  Jacques";  and  in  Russia  even 
to-day  if  we  want  to  understand  the  political  side  at  least  of  the 
new  faith  we  must  turn  back  for  at  least  a  moment  to  Rousseau. 
Unlike  the  faith  of  his  predecessor,  Montesquieu,  the  father, 
if  there  was  one,  of  the  American  Constitution,  and  unlike  the 
sociology  and  most  of  the  Socialism  of  our  time,  the  social  faith 
of  Rousseau  was  based  on  a  conception  of  the  moral  duty  of  the 
individual  rather  than  on  a  mere  evaluation  and  acceptance 
of  the  conditions  and  necessities  of  history.  Rousseau  based 
his  principles  and  ideas  not  on  what  has  been,  but,  as  he  declared, 
on  what  ought  to  be.  Here  he  is  at  one  with  Tolstoi,  who 
replaced  him  in  a  sense  in  Russia.  Like  Tolstoi  also,  Rousseau 
was  not  at  all  satisfied  to  give  society  a  mere  scheme  of  political 
or  social  principles.  He  felt  that  no  healthy  social  organism 
could  exist  on  the  basis  of  a  sort  of  civil  religion,  common  beliefs 

428 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  429 

that  should  hold  society  together  and  furnish  the  foundation 
of  a  social  faith. 

To-day  Rousseau  no  longer  answers  definitely  the  prevailing 
social  questions,  but  at  least  he  formulated  the  great  question 
as  it  should  be  formulated.  He  asked  not  what  kind  of  govern- 
ment is  best  suited  to  the  men  of  the  time,  but  what  kind  of 
government  will  form  the  best  men.  His  question  is,  then, 
what  is  permanent  and  what  can  be  improved  in  man.  His 
social  principles  all  rest  on  a  moral  study  of  human  nature, 
with  no  special  relation  to  conditions  that  happen  to  exist  now 
or  have  existed  for  a  few  generations  or  centuries.  He  asks 
what  is  the  destiny  of  man,  what  can  be  made  of  him,  and  what 
government  is  necessary  to  this  end.  In  contrast  with  Montes- 
quieu, whose  ideas  prevailed  before  Rousseau  and  still  prevail 
in  England,  the  United  States,  and  other  countries,  Rousseau 
was  a  pure  democrat.  His  first  principle  was  that  the  sovereign 
people  could  not  be  bound  even  by  its  own  actions ;  to  him  there 
could  be  no  written  constitution,  for  he  demanded  that  the  first 
question  to  be  asked  in  every  governmental  assembly  ought  to 
be,  what  form  of  government  do  we  want.  The  sovereign 
people  of  Rousseau  had  the  right  at  any  moment  to  revoke 
the  power  of  its  agent,  the  government;  this  was  the  principle 
that  we  know  to-day  as  the  imperative  mandate.  A  law  that 
the  people  had  not  ratified  was  not  a  law ;  this  was  the  principle 
now  called  the  referendum.  To  Rousseau  a  representative 
government  was  a  really  free  government  only  during  the 
elections,  only  while  the  voters  were  actually  exercising  their 
will  —  afterward  they  were  absolutely  enslaved. 

All  these  principles,  it  will  be  remembered,  were  adopted 
during  the  French  Revolution  by  not  only  the  extreme  revolu- 
tionary Jacobins,  but  even  the  moderate  Girondists.  If  they 
had  been  put  into  practice,  as  the  latter  indeed  demanded, 
during  the  trial  of  Louis  XVI.  the  French  king  would  never 
have  been  executed  and  the  chief  disgrace  of  the  Revolution, 
the  "Terror,"  would  never  have  come  to  be. 

Sovereignty  for  Rousseau  was  also  indivisible.  He  abhorred 
Montesquieu's  (the  American)  system  of  checks  and  balances. 
In  all  other  important  respects  also  Montesquieu  was  a  perfect 
contrast,  demanding  as  he  did  that  laws  be  rarely  altered,  that 


430  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  only  way  to  rule  rulers  was  to  change  them  frequently  and  to 
divide  their  power,  that  if  two  dangerous  arms  of  government 
were  both  limited  by  the  other  the  people  were  comparatively 
safe  from  oppression,  that  there  should  be  a  second  legislative 
chamber  composed  of  persons  of  birth,  wealth  and  honours  — 
all  principles  that  in  their  application  in  America  to-day  enable 
the  capitalistic  power  to  go  far  toward  controlling  the  govern- 
ment. But  Montesquieu  was  at  least  logical.  Like  Alexander 
Hamilton,  he  was  perfectly  conscious  that  he  was  as  much  of  an 
aristocrat  as  democrat.  If  a  democratic  republic,  he  says,  be 
founded  on  commerce,  individuals  may  safely  possess  great 
riches,  for  the  spirit  of  commerce  brings  with  it  that  of  economy, 
moderation,  labour,  wisdom,  tranquillity,  and  order.  In  other 
words,  a  commercial  state  to  Montesquieu  has  all  the  political 
virtues.  For  Rousseau  it  has  all  the  vices ;  for  him  democracy 
requires  absolutely  certain  equality  of  fortune.  To  Rousseau 
Montesquieu's  republic  might  indeed  be  a  republic  after  the 
order  of  the  oligarchies  of  Venice  or  Florence,  but  it  had  no 
claim  to  the  title  of  democracy. 

In  the  free  and  democratic  form  of  government  conceived 
by  the  prophet  of  the  French  Revolution,  "each  one  of  us  puts 
his  person  and  all  his  power  under  the  supreme  direction  of  the 
general  will ;  and  we  receive  into  our  body  every  member  as  an 
indivisible  part  of  the  whole."  This  great  conception  rested, 
it  may  be  seen,  on  faith  in  the  absolute  unity  between  the  indi- 
vidual and  the  government,  transcending  in  this  respect  all  social 
philosophies  which  see  some  conflict  of  interest  between  society 
and  the  individual.  Rousseau  reached  this  height  in  his  view 
of  society  because  of  his  equally  unified  conception  of  the  moral 
nature  of  the  individual.  "The  truly  free  man,"  he  says,  in 
"Emile,"  "wishes  only  for  what  he  can  achieve  and  only  does 
what  pleases  him." 

Applied  to  social  life  this  feeling  of  the  unity  of  man's  nature, 
led  to  the  conclusion  that  "as  soon  as  the  public  service  ceases 
to  be  the  principal  business  of  the  citizens  .  .  .  the  state 
is  already  near  to  ruin."  Rousseau  demanded  then,  as  much 
as  Tolstoi  or  the  Russian  Socialist  of  to-day,  not  only  pure 
democracy  but  the  complete  devotion  of  the  individual  to  the 
general  welfare.     He  had  no  mystical  belief  that  the  devotion 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  431 

of  every  man  to  his  own  private  business  would  necessarily  lead 
to  the  general  good. 

Rousseau's  successor  in  Russia  was  partially ,  and  for  a  certain 
time  at  least,  Tolstoi,  but  contemporary  with  Tolstoi,  or  almost 
so,  have  been  the  teachings  of  another  international  thinker, 
read  more  in  Russia  than  in  any  other  land,  Karl  Marx.  I  shall 
not  stop  to  characterise  the  teachings  of  the  founder  of  German 
Socialism  any  longer  than  to  say  that  his  influence  in  present- 
day  Russia  has  to  be  reckoned  alongside  that  of  Rousseau,  and 
certainly  above  that  of  Tolstoi.  Perhaps  the  chief  significance 
of  Tolstoi  for  Russia,  where  Marxism  is  the  dominant  social 
theory  among  the  present  generation,  is  his  antagonism  to  it. 
Tolstoi  himself  feels  so  strongly  his  antagonism  to  Marx  that  he 
bears  proudly  the  title  of  Marx's  most  bitter  opponent,  the 
philosophical  anarchist,  rather  than  that  of  Social  Democrat 
monopolised  by  the  Marxian  school.  We  look  on  him,  however, 
as  a  complement  rather  than  an  opponent  of  Marx.  We  do  not 
and  cannot  deny  the  antagonism,  but  as  far  as  their  practical 
proposals  are  concerned  we  say  that  the  points  of  strength  in 
Marx  are  for  the  most  part  the  weak  points  of  Tolstoi,  just  as 
we  say  that  the  essential  weaknesses  of  Marxism  are  the  very 
elements  of  strength  in  Tolstoi's  doctrine. 

Tolstoi  indeed  recognises  many  of  the  most  fundamental 
principles  of  Marxian  Socialism  and  elaborates  them  in  the  most 
effective  way.  To  Tolstoi,  as  to  Marx,  the  struggle  between  the 
rich  and  the  poor,  the  employer  and  the  employee,  is  a  bitter 
reality.     Both  recognise  the  existence  of  this  ** class  struggle.'* 

But  while  Tolstoi  recognises  the  struggle  he  does  not  express 
it  in  Marx's  dogmatic  form,  but  feels,  like  so  many  other  Russian 
Socialists,  that  it  is  a  conflict  not  between  the  "haves"  and 
"have-nots,"  but  rather  between  those  who  have  more  and 
those  who  have  less.  Laying  the  chief  emphasis,  as  he  does, 
on  its  spiritual  and  not  on  its  material  aspect,  he  does  not  feel 
that  the  question  of  a  small  amount  of  property  decides  the  po- 
sition of  an  individual  in  the  conflict.  At  the  same  time  he 
gives  equal  importance  to  other  struggles,  those  between  indivi- 
duals and  nations,  and  condemns  all  as  the  expression  of  the  same 
irrehgious  and  unsocial  hatred  that  characterises  present-day 
mankind  in  his  social  relationships. 


432  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

It  might  appear  that  the  economist,  Marx,  and  the  religionist, 
Tolstoi,  had  few  points  of  contact;  but  since  Marx  concerns 
himself  with  all  society,  including  religion,  and  Tolstoi  applies 
his  religion  to  economic  questions,  this  is  not  the  case.  In 
regard  to  the  land  question,  Tolstoi  is  undoubtedly  a  kind  of 
Socialist.  He  agrees  with  the  fundamental  principle  of  Socialism 
that  the  work  of  society  must  be  reorganised.  In  our  conversa- 
tion he  explained  that  he  thought  this  could  be  done  according 
to  the  principles  of  Henry  George ;  at  any  rate  he  had  a  supreme 
faith  in  the  soundness  of  the  life  and  instincts  of  the  country 
people.  But  at  the  same  time  he  surprised  me  by  acknowledg- 
ing quite  frankly  that  he  was  not  clear  as  to  how  the  future 
society  could  be  organised  in  the  towns.  Here,  then,  we  have 
a  point  where  a  third  person  may  well  reconcile  Tolstoi's  economy 
with  that  of  Marx.  Of  course  the  disciples  of  neither  would 
tolerate  such  a  reconciliation.  But  since  Marx  expressed  more 
or  less  pity  or  even  contempt  for  the  peasant  and  displayed 
very  little  knowledge  of  the  evolution  through  which  the  peasant 
has  passed,  we  may  well  decide  that  Tolstoi  understands  better 
the  conditions  of  his  peasants,  just  as  Marx  was  unquestionably 
a  master  of  all  questions  concerning  most  nearly  his  workingmen. 
It  is  indeed  on  this  principle  that  the  Russian  political  movement 
is  solving  the  great  social  problem.  It  is  bent  on  finding  a 
common  ground  for  the  best  parts  of  the  doctrine  of  Marx  and 
Henry  George. 

The  Labour  Group  in  the  Duma,  representing  the  majority 
of  the  Russian  peasantry,  in  proposing  a  solution  of  the  land 
question,  proposed  at  the  same  time  to  solve  the  labour  question 
for  the  workingmen.  It  was  for  this  reason  perhaps  that  its 
delegate,  Anikine,  was  received  as  a  Socialist  by  an  international 
congress  at  London  in  1906.  For  this  revolutionary  land  reform 
of  the  Labour  Group  is  Socialism  of  the  broadest  and  deepest 
kind.  In  demanding  that  each  individual  shall  be  supplied 
with  land,  while  knowing  full  well  that  there  is  not  enough  land 
to  give  any  one  all  that  he  needs,  the  Labour  Group  proposed 
to  make  the  Russian  Government  responsible  for  the  economic 
well  being  of  each  and  every  citizen.  In  insisting  that  every 
individual  should  have  a  right  to  his  share  in  the  soil  the  Group 
offered  an  alternative  of  agricultural  labour  to  every  workingman 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  433 

in  the  country.  In  declaring  that  no  man  should  have  more 
land  than  he  could  work  with  his  own  hands  the  Group  pro- 
posed to  abolish  wage  labour  in  the  agricultural  sections. 

The  result  of  this  great  social  revolution  would  be  that  the 
farmers  would  become  interested  in  the  upbuilding  of  indus- 
try, not  only  to  gain  a  market  but  also  to  lift  from  their  own 
shoulders  the  necessity  of  dividing  their  land  with  the  disin- 
herited. The  farmers  would  share  the  burden  of  the  underpaid 
and  unemployed  workers  of  the  towns,  but  in  return  they  would 
demand  by  right  from  the  general  Government  every  possible 
support  for  agriculture  in  the  form  of  cheaper  transportation, 
cheap  credit,  and  wherever  beneficial  to  them,  free  trade.  At 
the  same  time,  having  the  burden  of  the  labourer  on  their 
shoulders,  they  would  have  his  interest  at  heart;  they  would 
want  to  build  up  industry  and  encourage  business  enterprise, 
while  they  would  be  jealous  of  all  exceptional  profits  and  would 
join  their  forces  against  those  of  private  capital  alongside  the 
working  people  and  professional  classes  of  the  towns.  For 
according  to  Tolstoi,  according  to  the  Labour  Group,  and 
according  to  all  the  popular  and  Socialist  parties  of  Russia, 
the  larger  part  of  the  profits  of  private  capital  are  unearned. 
Tolstoi  has  best  expressed  the  feeling  of  all. 

"  It  a  statesman,"  writes  Tolstoi,  "says  that  besides  a  personal 
advantage  he  has  in  view  the  common  benefit,  we  cannot  help 
believing  him,  and  each  of  us  knows  such  men;  but  a  business 
man  from  the  nature  of  his  occupations,  cannot  have  and  would 
be  ridiculous  in  the  sight  of  his  fellows  if  in  his  business  he  did 
aim  at  something  besides  the  increasing  of  his  own  wealth  and 
the  keeping  of  it.  And  therefore  the  working  people  do  not 
consider  the  activity  of  business  men  of  any  help  to  them,  for 
their  activity  is  associated  with  violence  toward  the  working 
people;  and  its  object  is  not  the  good  of  the  people  but  always 
and  only  personal  advantage." 

This  is  the  view  not  of  Tolstoi  alone,  nor  of  the  popular 
class,  but  of  nearly  all  classes  of  Russian  society.  Of  course 
he  is  speaking  not  of  the  business  man  who  is  also  something 
else,  but  of  the  business  man  as  business  man.  As  far  as  a  man 
is  absorbed  wholly  in  business,  says  the  Russian  opinion  of 
to-day,  he  cannot  have  in  view  the  common  good. 


434  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

Tolstoi  has  also  expressed  better  than  any  other  Russian  the 
common  belief  of  the  majority  of  the  nation  that  capitalis- 
tic property  is  the  root  of  all  the  evil  of  present-day  society. 
In  another  passage,  equally  a  part  of  Russia's  message,  Tolstoi 
used  the  word  "property  "  instead  of  "capital,"  but  since  he  is  a 
follower  of  Henry  George,  he  doubtless  has  in  mind  rather  than 
property  of  all  kinds  only  capital  and  land. 

"Property,"  he  says,  "  is  the  root  of  all  evil;  and  at  the  same 
time  property  is  that  toward  which  all  the  activity  of  our 
modern  society  is  directed,  and  that  which  directs  the  activ- 
ity of  the  world  states  and  government  intrigues,  makes  wars 
for  the  sake  of  property,  for  the  possession  of  the  banks  of  the 
Rhine,  of  land  in  Africa,  China,  the  Balkan  Peninsula.  Bankers, 
merchants,  manufacturers,  landlords,  labour,  use  cunning,  tor- 
ment themselves,  torment  others,  for  the  sake  of  property; 
government  functionaries,  tradesmen, landlords,  struggle, deceive, 
oppress,  suffer,  for  the  sake  of  property;  courts  of  justice  and 
poHce  protect  property ;  penal  servitude,  prisons,  all  the  terrors 
of  so-called  punishments  —  all  is  done  for  the  sake  of  property." 

In  spite  of  the  jealousy  felt  against  him  by  the  Socialist 
parties,  especially  the  more  orthodox  Marxian  party,  Tolstoi 
is  the  greatest  opponent  of  capitalism  in  Russia  and  in  the  world 
to-day.  He  is  indeed  a  party  in  himself  — not  a  political  party, 
of  course,  but  the  exponent  of  a  social  programme.  This  social 
programme  may  be  impracticable,  but  it  is  among  the  greatest 
menaces  to  the  continued  existence  of  the  Czarism  supported  by 
international  capital.  Tolstoi's  great  contribution,  as  I  have 
already  suggested,  is  his  attack  on  the  intellectual  defenders 
of  the  present  system.  "Science,"  he  says,  "has  proclaimed 
struggle  and  hatred  as  necessary  and  beneficent  conditions  of 
human  life."  This  also  is  a  feature  of  the  criticism  of  all  the 
very  intellectual  and  truly  philosophical  Russian  movement. 
"The  appropriation  of  the  labour  of  others  by  a  strong  man, 
which  formerly  theologians  called  Divine  predestination,"  says 
Tolstoi  in  another  of  his  strongest  passages,  "which  philosophers 
called  inevitable  conditions  of  life,  scientific  science  now  calls 
the  organic  division  of  labour.  All  the  importance  of  the  ruling 
science  consists  in  this  alone.  This  science  now  becomes  the 
dispenser  of  diplomas  for  idleness,  because  she  alone  in  her 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  435 

temples  analyses  and  determines  what  activity  is  parasitic 
and  what  is  organic  in  the  social  organism.  As  if  men  could  not, 
each  for  himself,  much  better  decide  it  and  more  quickly,  too, 
by  consulting  his  reason  and  conscience."  "When  art  and 
science  really  existed,"  he  says  elsewhere,  "they  were  intelligent 
to  all  men."  This  demand,  then,  for  democracy ,  applied  not  only 
to  political,  economic,  and  social  questions,  but  also  to  science 
and  art,  is  the  great  contribution  of  Tolstoi  to  revolutionary 
Socialism.  Often  half-hearted  democrats  take  refuge  in  the 
advocacy  of  an  "aristocracy  of  mind  and  heart."  This  to 
Tolstoi  is  not  only  a  sin  and  a  crime  but  the  very  source  of  all 
the  evil  of  our  time,  since  men  are  led  astray  not  so  much  by 
their  mere  selfish  desires  as  by  their  very  unwillingness  to  obey 
the  appeals  of  society  instead  of  answering  only  their  own 
intellectual  or  aesthetic  whims. 

Tolstoi,  as  I  have  said,  placed  all  his  hopes  on  the  peasant, 
while  Marx  in  his  communist  manifesto  spoke  of  the  "idiocy 
of  rural  life."  According  to  a  recent  interpreter  (Boudin)  Marx 
was  at  the  best  filled  with  "compassion"  for  the  "hopeless  case 
of  the  poor  peasant."  The  new  Russian  Socialism  takes  no 
such  patronising  view.  It  does  not  share  the  common  suspicions 
against  either  half  of  the  population,  the  peasants  or  the  work- 
ingmen.  Already  even  the  Russian  Marxians  concede  that  the 
peasantry  of  Russia  may  make  as  good  revolutionists  and 
democrats,  if  not  as  good  Socialists,  as  the  workingmen.  But 
the  Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  goes  further  and  feels  that 
the  agricultural  population  will  make  good  Socialists  also. 
Their  chief  writers  stake  everything  on  the  peasants  without 
deserting  the  workingmen.  One  of  them,  Tchemov,  tries  to 
interpret  Marx,  to  prove  that  he  did  understand  the  peasant  and 
points  to  the  efforts  of  nearly  all  the  European  Socialist  parties  to 
fix  up  their  doctrines  to  please  the  agricultural  population  and 
to  accept  as  justifiable  some  form  of  private  property  in  land, 
in  order  that  the  country  people  shall  not  be  frightened  away 
from  Socialism  by  fear  of  losing  their  possessions. 

But  another  thinker  of  the  Socialist  Revolutionists,  rather 
than  endeavouring  to  make  one  more  interpretation  of  Marx, 
seeks  the  historical  predecessors  of  the  new  Socialist  doctrine 
in  the  French  Revolution.     Chisko  and  others  who  think  with 


436  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

him  value  Bakunine,  Marx's  chief  antagonist,  almost  as  much 
as  they  do  Marx  himself.  In  championing  the  cause  of  the  foun- 
der of  modern  anarchism  they  show  that  they  are  as  much  opposed 
to  coercive  government  as  they  are  to  private  property  and 
justify  the  claim  that  the  object  of  their  attack  is  not  private 
property  any  more  than  it  is  government,  but  capitalism  in 
so  far  as  it  roots  itself  in  both. 

"The  fundamental  ideal  of  the  communists*  manifesto'* 
(the  ten  commandments  of  Marxian  Socialism),  says  Chisko, 
"that  economic  phenomena,  indepeftdently  of  the  will  and  ten- 
dencies of  mankind,  are  preparing  the  technical  material  and 
psychical  elements  of  the  social  revolution,  must  be  renounced." 
Chisko  then,  as  well  as  the  majority  of  the  Socialist  Revolution- 
ary Party,  is  at  one  with  Rousseau  and  Tolstoi  in  placing  the 
first  emphasis  on  the  will  of  man. 

The  Socialist  Revolutionists  accuse  their  orthodox  Marxian 
predecessors  of  defending  only  the  interests  of  wage  labourers 
who  possess  nothing,  the  so-called  "proletariat,"  and  not  those 
of  labour  in  general.  It  is  on  this  ground  that  Tchemov 
accuses  them  of  lacking  both  in  true  Socialism  and  true 
democracy.  Indeed,  in  attacking  private  property  instead  of 
private  capital,  in  refusing  to  recognise  that  a  peasant  even 
though  he  is  in  possession  of  a  piece  of  land,  provided  he 
does  not  employ  another,  may  be  as  social  as  the  working- 
man,  the  older  Socialists  had  abandoned  a  principle  of  equal 
importance  certainly  with  Socialism  itself,  namely  democracy. 
The  Social  Democracy  has  brought  Socialism  in  the  various 
nations  to  a  many-sided  crisis  precisely  because  of  its  undem- 
ocratic character. 

If  a  Socialist  organisation  is  attached  to  Socialism  (collectiv- 
ism) rather  than  to  democracy,  it  is  a  natural  result  that  English 
Fabian  Societies  should  arise  —  that  favour,  or  at  least  accept 
without  much  resistance,  even  so  undemocratic  an  idea  as  the 
justification  of  a  minority  rule.  This  leads  at  once,  of  course, 
to  the  idea  of  a  domination  by  some  minority,  usually  some 
part  of  the  middle  class.  The  Socialism  then  proposed  is  not 
any  fundamental  change  of  society  but  only  a  State  Socialism, 
the  extension  of  the  functions  of  the  government. 

If  the  working  people,  unwilling  to  accept  the  domination 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  437 

of  a  numerical  majority,  insist  on  pushing  forward  their  Social- 
istic beliefs  in  a  revolutionary  manner,  then  the  penalty  of  this 
form  of  undemocratic  Socialism  is  a  Paris  Commune.  If,  on 
the  other  hand,  while  still  remaining  revolutionary  and  undem- 
ocratic, they  propose  to  wait  for  a  majority,  they  announce  that 
with  the  aid  of  their  majority  they  are  going  to  establish 
a  "dictatorship"  of  the  proletariat,  and  all  the  neutral 
and  wavering  elements  of  society  are  frightened  into 
reaction  by  the  idea  that  all  minorities  are  to  be  crushed 
by  the  working  class. 

But  the  undemocratic  Socialists  give  up  their  revolutionary 
spirit.  They  console  themselves  by  some  illusion  of  politics, 
some  kind  of  parliamentarism.  So  in  Germany  we  have  seen 
the  naive  working  class  under  the  leadership  of  Bebel  calmly 
looking  forward  to  the  day  when  the  majority  of  the  nation 
would  be  workingmen  —  a  day  whose  arrival  we  may  well 
doubt  in  any  self-sufficient  modem  country.  Nor  is  this  the 
greatest  danger  for  this  latter  peaceful  and  undemocratic  type 
of  movement.  It  stakes  everything  on  the  permanence  of 
constitutionalism  and  universal  suffrage;  it  fails  to  learn  from 
the  recent  examples  in  Germany  and  Russia  and  many  other 
countries  that  it  is  as  easy  for  political  institutions  to  be  turned 
backward  as  forward,  and  that  without  democracy,  without  a 
majority  in  possession  of  the  concrete  power  to  enforce  its  will, 
no  people  has  the  hope  of  evolving  a  great  social  movement, 
that  no  people  is  protected  by  a  mere  paper  constitution  or 
an  election  law  in  the  hands  of  a  hostile  power. 

The  Russian  Socialists  are  both  revolutionists  and  democrats. 
They  know  that  they  have  to  win  liberty  and  Socialism  by 
fighting  for  them,  and  they  know  that  they  can  hope  for  nothing 
unless  they  can  maintain  a  unity  of  the  masses  of  the  population 
both  of  the  towns  and  country.  It  is  in  order  to  maintain 
this  unity  that  they  have  sought  a  reconciliation  of  the 
revolutionary  social  principles  with  regard  to  the  land,  those 
of  Henry  George,  and  the  revolutionary  view  of  capitalism, 
that  of  Marx. 

It  is  this  unification  of  all  the  highest  conceptions  of  Socialism 
and  politics  that  we  shall  learn  from  Russia,  rather  than  any 
entirely  new  social  ideals.      It  is  precisely  because  Russia  is 


438  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

so  much  a  part  of  the  modem  world  that  we  cannot  and 
must  not  expect  an  entirely  new  and  strange  ideal,  but  we 
can  expect  and  have  already  received  from  her  higher  and 
better  expressions  of  the  profoundest  social  conceptions  that 
have  yet  been  formulated  by  men. 

II 

The  Russian  Revolution  gives  the  world  more  than  a  social 
programme.  The  new  Russian  ideas  tend  to  revolutionise  the 
very  basis  of  modern  thought,  not  only  with  regard  to  society, 
but  with  regard  to  all  life ;  they  tend  to  revolutionise  the  method 
of  reasoning  and  feeling  of  every  individual;  they  attack  the 
modern  religion,  the  only  real  deeply  rooted  religion  of  our 
day,  the  theory  of  evolution,  considered  not  as  a  mere  hypothe- 
sis of  physical  science,  but  as  a  guide  to  all  life.  Russians  in 
general,  even  conservatives,  are  agreed  that  the  great  movement 
that  is  gaining  possession  of  the  nation  means  not  merely  a 
change  of  the  constitution,  but  if  I  may  quote  from  a  private 
conversation  with  Michael  Stachovitch,  one  of  the  most  moder- 
ate, "a  change  of  all  institutions,  of  all  relations,  of  all  life,  of 
everything." 

In  developing  the  new  idea  of  the  laws  of  the  growth  of 
society,  the  Russian  people  are  also  reaching  a  new  conception 
of  all  life,  of  all  realms  of  human  activity,  even  of  science,  art 
and  religion.  For  the  conception  of  the  law  of  social  growth 
that  prevails  in  any  society  itself,  marks  the  whole  psychical 
condition  of  that  society.  When  this  conception  changes  all 
other  ideas  change;  this  is  why  Russia  is  leading,  not  only  in 
social  thinking  and  ideals,  but  in  all  the  realms  of  spiritual  life. 

Because  all  the  nations  have  common  economic  problems  — 
how  to  secure  for  society  the  enormous  unearned  land  rents  that 
now  go  into  the  pockets  of  individuals,  how  to  manage  the  rail- 
ways and  how  to  give  the  profits  from  the  great  economies  of 
modem  industry  to  consumers  and  employees  instead  of  leaving 
them  in  the  hands  of  capitalists  —  the  social  programme^  and 
philosophy  of  the  revolution  is  international.  But  the  new 
conception  of  life  itself  had  to  come  from  Russia,  the  only 
country  in  profound  spiritual  upheaval  since  the  conquest  of 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  439 

the  world  by  the  new  scientific  religion,  now  too  deeply  rooted 
to  be  eradicated  under  ordinary  conditions  of  life.  The  French 
Revolution  overthrew  not  only  Louis  XVI.  in  France  and  shook 
feudalism  in  all  Europe;  it  also  upset  authorities  in  philosophy, 
religion,  science,  and  art  and  prepared  the  way  for  Kant  and 
Darwin  as  world  powers.  Humanity  has  undergone  no  French 
Revolution,  no  spiritual  world  upheaval  for  a  century,  and  as  a 
consequence  new  authorities  begin  to  rule  and  we  have  been 
sinking  gradually  into  unfruitful  skepticism  and  even  into  a 
virulently  anti-social  faith. 

Several  generations  ago  several  great  social  thinkers,  like 
Marx  and  Proudhon,  began  to  write  how  society  develops,  not 
only  by  slow,  quiet,  orderly,  and  continuous  evolution,  but  also 
by  rapid  changes,  by  apparent  though  not  real  breaks  in  the 
ordinary  process.  The  best  known  and  most  influential  of  these 
writers  was  Karl  Marx.  Marx  conceived  a  new  idea  of  the 
law  of  social  development,  especially  of  that  particular  form 
of  development  known  as  revolutions.  He,  however,  was 
chiefly  concerned  with  that  revolution  which  he  thought  was 
rapidly  approaching  at  the  time  he  wrote.  As  he  conceived 
of  revolution  as  the  "open  and  violent  rebellion"  we  usually 
know  under  that  name,  he  did  not  look  further  ahead  into  the 
future  than  to  the  next  catastrophe,  he  did  not  try  to  foresee  the 
kind  of  revolution  that  humanity  should  have  to  go  through 
with  for  a  longer  period.  This  lack  of  far-sightedness  vitiated 
his  doctrine.  To  followers  of  Marx  the  conception  that  revolu- 
tion in  the  social  psychology  of  mankind,  in  the  methods  of  the 
control  of  society  over  individuals  and  of  individuals  over 
society,  should  continue  forever,  might  be  even  a  misuse  of  the 
term    revolution. 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  world  is  already  in  possession 
of  Marx's  elaborate  doctrine  of  revolution,  the  so-called  scien- 
tific Socialism,  the  prevailing  conception  of  social  growth  in  all 
countries,  even  among  the  most  scientific  persons,  is  still  of  the 
simplest  order.  The  great  masses  still  believe  in  the  same  form 
of  linear  social  development.  To  them  society  moves  along 
more  or  less  straight  lines  in  one  direction  or  another,  and  this 
they  call  "evolution."  To  the  more  educated  the  conception 
is  slightly  more  complicated  and  the  idea  is  perhaps  that  of  an 


440  RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 

"evolution"  along  the  line  of  a  spiral  —  society  is  supposed  to 
move  from  one  side  to  the  other  of  the  spiral,  to  return  to  a 
similar  position  vertically  to  the  one  it  occupied  before,  but  on 
a  higher  plane.  It  is  doubtless  true,  as  many  psychologists 
say,  that  we  must  use,  as  handles  or  tools  of  thought,  certain 
physical  images  and  certain  mechanical  figures  of  speech,  but 
if  our  logical  and  reasoning  powers  have  not  developed  further 
than  this,  let  us  at  least  see  that  our  images  and  figures  are 
more  developed.  Let  us  try,  like  those  Russians,  all  of  whose 
waking  and  sleeping  thoughts  are  absorbed  by  the  social  prob- 
lem, to  conceive  society  in  a  more  subtle  and  realistic  manner. 
If  we  must  use  figures,  let  us  imagine  social  development  as 
taking  place,  not  along  any  single  line,  no  matter  how  curved 
or  complicated,  but  in  every  possible  direction  at  once  and  in 
all  three  dimensions.  By  the  use  of  this  figure  we  wotdd  be 
rescued  from  many  of  the  absurdities  of  the  prevailing  concept 
tion,  we  could  for  the  first  time  conceive  of  society  as  growing 
in  two  opposite  directions  at  the  same  time,  or  developing  in 
one  direction  without  losing  what  had  already  been  gained  in 
another.  We  would  not  speak,  then,  of  political  revolution  as 
being  the  result  of  reaction,  or  of  reaction  as  the  inevitable 
result  of  revolution.  If  we  must  put  our  concept  of  the  tendency 
of  society  at  a  given  moment  in  a  single  figure  of  speech,  we 
could  speak  of  the  movement  of  the  centre  of  gravity  of  the 
growing  body  politic  in  some  new  direction,  and  along  some 
given  line.  But  a  solid  body  growing  always  in  many  directions 
would  be  something  far  different  from  our  old  figure  of  society 
as  a  point  moving  along  a  line,  since  bodies  of  the  same  bulk  and 
the  same  centre  could  have  an  infinite  variety  of  form  and 
structure.  To  employ  this  figure  for  our  own  purposes,  if  the 
resultant,  the  sum  of  all  the  motions  of  society  in  various 
directions,  the  general  movement  of  the  whole,  should  itself 
suddenly  take  a  new  direction,  or  commence  to  move  much  more 
rapidly  along  the  same  path,  we  should  have  what  would  be 
more  properly  called  revolution  than  evolution. 

Revolution  is  simply  a  new  rapidity,  or  suddenly  changed 
direction,  of  evolution.  This  is  the  great  truth  that  the  modems, 
outside  of  Russia,  are  forgetting,  and  in  forgetting  it  are  risk- 
ing all  the  freedom,  democracy,  and  accelerated  development  of 


/ 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  441 

the  race  that  revolution  has  obtained  for  mankind.  Some 
advances  have  been  obtained  by  evolution,  exclusive  of  revolu- 
tion; I  am  not  opposing  one  to  the  other,  but  on  the  contrary 
I  am  objecting  most  vigorously  to  this  very  fictitious  opposition, 
to  the  consideration  either  of  evolution  or  of  revolution  as  a 
superior  form  of  social  development.  To  speak  of  evolution  as 
against  revolution,  or  to  exclude  rapid  and  strikingly  new  devel- 
opments as  entirely  inadmissible,  as  a  higher  form  of  social 
progress,  is  to  adopt  the  most  fundamentally  conservative  and 
reactionary  idea  ever  yet  thought  out  by  the  mind  of  man. 
Many  religions  and  theories  of  the  state  have  spiritually  sub- 
jected humanity,  but  none  were  ever  so  universal,  so  dangerous, 
and  so  terrible  as  this.  If  we  speak  of  social  development  as 
evolution,  and  if  from  this  term  evolution  we  exclude  all  revolu- 
tionary development,  we  are  in  the  toils  of  a  dogmatic  creed  or 
philosophy  worse  than  anything  the  world  has  seen  since  the 
time  of  the  ancient  Egyptians. 

This  reactionary  scientific-religious  faith  was  invited  by  the 
dull  neutral  attitude  toward  moral  and  social  questions  held 
by  the  great  scientists  in  the  middle  of  the  last  century,  who 
divided  life  into  science  and  —  life.  Spencer  and  his  school 
had  no  social  or  individual  faith  to  offer.  They  converted 
mankind  to  an  almost  servile  respect  for  physical  science, 
destroyed  by  the  aid  of  this  science  much  of  the  old  philosophy 
and  many  of  the  old  moral  and  social  ideals,  and  offered  nothing 
to  take  their  place.  Their  successors  have  not  been  so  modest; 
the  place  was  there  visibly  empty ;  only  the  voices  of  the  devo- 
tees of  science  could  fill  it,  for  other  voices  were  no  longer  heard ; 
God  had  been  overthrown,  the  throne  was  empty  and  there 
was  every  temptation  to  set  up  the  devil  in  his  stead. 

A  generation  ago  John  Morley  in  his  interesting  book  on 
"Compromise,"  that  sums  up  so  well  the  best  political  thought 
of  our  intellectual  predecessors,  deplored  the  lack  of  faith  in 
the  thinking  of  the  English  people  of  that  day.  To-day  we  are 
facing  a  still  greater  evil  in  the  prevalence  not  of  indifference 
but  of  a  positively  anti-social  faith.  Morley  complained  of  a 
profound  distrust  of  all  general  principles,  of  the  popular  sup- 
position that  there  was  some  antagonism  between  principle 
and  expediency,   between  theory   and  fact.     He  accused  his 


442  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

generation  of  thinking  only  of  the  interest  of  the  day  and  very 
little  of  the  day  to  come.  **What  great  political  causes," 
he  asked,  "her  own,  or  another's,  is  England  defending  to-day? " 
He  might  have  asked  the  same  question  of  any  other  people  of 
the  time,  and  of  a  large  part  of  any  people  to-day. 

Morley,  like  Spencer  and  the  other  great  individualists  of 
his  time,  who  still  have  an  immense  influence,  especially  in 
America,  felt  deeply  the  need  of  the  recognition  of  "the  sacred- 
ness  of  principle."  "Elements  of  national  deterioration,"  he 
said,  "will  disappear  only  when  the  world  has  grown  into  the 
possession  of  a  new  doctrine;  when  that  day  comes,  all  good 
things  will  follow.  .  .  .  The  new  doctrine  itself  will  never 
come  except  from  spirits  predisposed  to  their  own  liberation. 
Our  day  of  small  calculations  and  petty  utility  must  first  pass 
away.  Our  vision  of  the  true  expediencies  must  reach  further 
and  deeper;  our  resolution  to  search  for  the  highest  verities, 
to  give  up  all  and  follow  them,  must  first  become  the  supreme 
part  of  ourselves."  Yet  Morley  and  his  generation  are  respon- 
sible more  than  all  others  for  the  further  deterioration  of  public 
opinion  with  regard  both  to  political  and  all  other  great  principles. 
For  instead  of  welcoming  the  only  new  doctrine  that  could 
save  or  help  society,  they  opposed  it  with  all  their  power; 
like  Morley  himself,  who,  though  he  acknowledged  some  form  of 
Socialism  was  inevitable,  proposed  to  die  fighting  it  with  back 
to  the  wall,  or  like  Spencer  who  called  it  the  coming  slavery. 
"Ours  is  a  country  where  love  of  constant  improvement 
ought  to  be  greater  than  anywhere  else,  because  the  fear  of 
revolution  is  less,"  wrote  Morley — but  the  fear  of  revolution, 
or  rather  the  hope  of  revolution,  is  the  mainspring  of  the 
greatest  progress  of  the  race. 

It  is  because  they  have  grasped  this  principle  of  social  politics 
that  the  Russian  spirit  is  so  great  to-day.  Once  having  lost 
the  highest  social  verities,  it  was  natural  that  Morley  and  his 
whole  generation  of  individualists  should  fall  into  the  very  gulf 
of  compromise  that  they  all  so  wished  to  avoid.  Already  Mill 
had  questioned  the  sovereignty  of  the  people,  the  first  principle 
of  all  social  progress,  and  given  some  credit  to  the  belief  that 
society  was  in  need  of  heroes  or  deliverers  to  govern  it.  Morley 
-accepted  Mill's  waverings  and  fell  even  further  than  he.     Seek- 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  443 

ing  "the  right  kind  of  compromise,"  like  the  moderate  party 
in  the  Russia  of  to-day,  he  bargained  away  most  of  his  great 
principles,  even  to  avoiding  the  issue  as  to  whether  he  favoured 
a  republic  or  a  monarchy  in  the  England  of  the  present  day. 

Since  individualism,  much  as  it  saw  the  need  of  it,  supplied 
no  social  faith,  Nietsche  and  Kipling  have  come  along  to  fill 
the  empty  place  until  now  the  new  popular  social  science,  as 
Tolstoi  rightly  says,  even  in  the  midst  of  our  so-called  civilisation, 
defends  the  survival  of  the  principle  of  the  tooth  and  claw; 
while  a  Henley  or  a  Nietsche  actually  glorifies  war,  not  for  its 
fruits  alone  but  because  they  see  in  it  the  noble  art.  In  seeking 
to  lay  the  philosophical  foundations  for  a  higher  individualism, 
in  endeavouring  to  inspire  mankind  with  the  passionate  desire 
to  produce  a  higher  type,  Nietsche  has  indeed  not  only  ignored 
society,  but  he  has  constructed  a  positively  anti-social  belief, 
leaving  no  place  but  slavery  or  death  for  the  overwhelming 
majority,  who  are  not  "supermen."  Yet  this  man's  phil- 
osophy rules  in  Germany  and  the  number  of  his  disciples  grows 
apace   in  other  lands! 

This  is  as  we  might  have  expected;  men  cannot  live  with- 
out faith;  we  must  either  idealise  the  coming  society,  including 
as  part  of  it  the  coming  man,  or  we  must  idealise  the  individual 
of  the  future  without  regard  to  society  and  the  race,  and  accept 
the  worship  of  mere  power  without  regard  to  any  other  question. 
Humanity  need  no  longer  go  without  a  faith  adapted  to  the 
times ;  the  Russians  have  already  found  it.  During  the  present 
generation,  say  the  Russians,  we  are  in  need  of  preachers  of 
revolution,  and  of  revolution  in  all  things.  The  goal  of  the  human 
race  is  best  expressed  perhaps  in  Schopenhauer's  "will  to  live" 
or  Nietsche*s  "will  to  power";  the  living  out  of  our  deepest 
instincts,  however  doubtful  when  applied  only  to  individuals, 
may  hold  true  if  applied  to  humanity  as  a  whole;  but  if  this 
is  so,  if  society  exists  to  fulfill  its  own  purpose  and  not  to  con- 
form to  fatal  and  fixed  conditions  of  environment,  the  now 
popular  use  or  misuse  of  the  conception  of  evolution  would  again 
be  consigned  to  a  secondary  r61e.  We  should  say  with  Maeter- 
linck in  his  essay,  "The  Bees,"  that  it  is  our  duty  to  seek  out  the 
ends  of  our  existence,  not  in  the  natural  environment  or  even 
in  htunan  history,  but  rather  in  the  study  of  the  structure  of  our 


444  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

own  psychical  and  physical  organs;  and  since  functions  are 
fixed  by  the  structure  of  organs,  to  live  the  life  we  were  bom 
for  —  to  travel  in  the  directions  pointed  out  by  our  own  organic 
ends  and  capacities,  under  the  limitations  of  our  own  physical 
and  psychical  organisms,  rather  than  under  the  external 
limitations  imposed  on  us  by  the  outside  universe,  considered 
by  the  evolutionary  or  historical  school  as  the  only  really 
important  element  of  our  environment.  According  to  this 
conception  it  is  not  the  function  of  man  and  society  to  try  to 
see  life  from  a  dead  scientific  standpoint,  to  endeavour  to  be 
objective  and  external,  as  it  were  to  put  ourselves  outside  of 
our  bodies,  but  to  give  up  this  equally  useless  and  impossible 
task  and  to  live  the  life  for  which  another  kind  of  science,  a 
physically  and  psychically  introspective  science,  a  science 
that  restores  man  to  his  true  place  in  the  centre  of  his  universe, 
shows  we  were  created. 

Here  is  a  truly  spiritual  conception  of  evolution  and  the 
struggle  for  existence.  In  this  conception  we  do  not  struggle 
against  one  another,  forced  to  internecine  strife  by  the 
narrow  limits  of  a  fixed  environment;  but  the  environment 
presents  itself  to  our  senses,  to  our  intelligence,  our  will  and 
our  power,  dumbly  pleading  to  us  for  such  recognition  as  it 
humanly  deserves,  each  element  of  the  environment  struggling 
with  the  other  to  be  taken  into  the  only  realm  that  is  real  to 
man,  that  of  our  physical  and  psychical  life,  in  order  there  to 
become  an  element  in  the  further  evolution  of  our  being.  This 
is  indeed  a  revolution  of  the  prevailing  evolutionary  theory. 
Instead  of  individuals  struggling  against  one  another  under  a 
more  or  less  fixed  environment,  this  new  world-outlook  regards 
human  evolution  as  being  a  struggle  of  environments  before  the 
human  individual,  the  arbiter  of  the  universe,  at  least  as  far 
as  mankind  is  concerned.  This  beautiful  concept  loses  nothing 
of  what  modem  science  has  gained  for  us;  it  merely  reverses 
the  inhuman  social  and  moral  principles  that  have  been  allowed 
almost  to  monopolise  the  applications  of  science  to  our  ideas 
of  human  life. 

To  worship  nature  objectively  as  some  scientists  advise 
us  to  do  is  to  return  very  near  to  the  psychology  of  the  primi- 
tive man,  who  in  his  devotion  both  to  the  devil  and  to  God  was 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  445 

paying  a  no  greater  tribute  to  the  maleficent  and  beneficent 
powers  of  nature.  It  is  to  go  back  even  of  the  ancient  Hebrews ; 
it  is  to  forget  that  mankind  is  a  chosen  race,  that  as  long  as 
there  is  a  single  human  family  left,  we  must  obey  nothing, 
not  even  non-human  "nature,"  which  is  absolutely  external 
to  ourselves,  but  must  follow  our  own  best  moral  reasons  and 
instincts  supported  by  a  scientific  study  of  the  nature  of  our 
physical  and  spiritual  selves. 

This  modem  return  to  nature  and  betrayal  of  man,  this 
adoption  of  the  standpoint  of  the  savages,  which  is  supposed  to 
be  preached  by  the  theory  of  evolution,  is  nothing  less  than 
impious  to  a  truly  social  people  like  the  Russians  of  to-day.  Of 
all  the  countries  of  the  world,  it  is  the  only  one  where  such 
pseudo-scientific  sociology  is  completely  discredited.  Yet  we 
all  feel  there  is  something  wrong. 

It  is  because  Tolstoi  attacks  this  pseudo-science  more  effec- 
tively than  anyone  else  that  he  is  the  most  respected  and  vener- 
ated man  alive  to-day,  even  in  countries  where  pernicious 
doctrines  rule.  If  Tolstoi  has  lost  nothing  of  the  love  and 
admiration  in  which  he  was  held  since  he  gave  up  trying  to 
entertain  and  please  his  readers  and  took  to  preaching  to  them  — 
this  is  due  to  the  fact  that  he  takes  an  absolute  and  moral  view 
of  life,  retaining  all  the  best  conclusions  of  the  ancient  philoso- 
phies and  religions  on  the  nature  of  man,  but  drawing  his 
materials  entirely  from  our  time.  Tolstoi  does  not  know  that 
we  are  related  to  all  things  as  well  as  to  all  men,  but  he  contends 
nevertheless  that  our  individual  and  social  duty  is  not  relative 
but  absolute.  There  is  for  each  individual  in  each  given 
moment  only  one  best  way ;  if  we  fall  below  our  appointed  func- 
tion as  it  is  shown  us  by  nature  and  our  own  best  instincts  and 
reasonings,  or  if  society  falls  in  the  same  way  below  its  appointed 
functions,  we  hear  from  our  individual  or  social  conscience 
and  know  we  have  done  wrong. 

This  view  places  man  again  in  the  centre  of  the  universe, 
and  gives  him  a  truly  unified  and  unbroken  conception  of  life 
and  of  society.  If  we  look  at  society  not  from  the  human,  but 
from  the  pseudo-scientific  or  objective  standpoint,  we  shall  fail 
to  understand  a  single  social  problem.  If,  for  instance,  political 
development  is  studied  apart  from  all  the  other  developments  of 


446  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

the  life  of  society  and  of  the  individuals  that  compose  it,  we 
shall  not  only  see  political  revolutions  in  the  sense  of  a  rapid 
evolution  or  evolution  in  some  new  direction,  but  we  shall  imag- 
ine we  see  or  fear  we  may  see  positive  gaps  in  the  continuity 
of  the  process  of  development.  As  long  as  we  consider  political 
or  even  social  evolution  as  a  thing  apart  from  the  rest  of  the 
science  of  life,  we  shall  stand  in  fear  of  these  gaps.  Indeed, 
ill-understood  interruptions  of  continuous  political  evolution 
are  so  common  that  it  is  often  even  denied  that  there  are  any 
laws  of  political  development.  We  do  not  know  what  politics 
will  bring  for  us  to-morrow  because  the  political  situation  of 
to-day  depends  not  on  the  political  situation  of  yesterday,  but 
on  that  of  industry,  science,  religion,  education,  public  morality, 
or  even  on  some  obscure  comer  of  social  life.  There  is  no  steady 
evolution  of  politics ;  there  is  only  a  continuous  evolution  of  life, 
while  politics  consists  of  an  endless  series  of  more  or  less  revolu- 
tionary transformations.  Indeed  it  is  only  when  politics  are 
least  important  and  have  the  least  fundamental  contact  with 
life,  that  there  can  be  anything  resembling  continuous  and  quiet 
political  evolution.  When  politics  become  vital,  when  the 
energies  of  the  individual  and  of  society  go  principally  and 
consciously  in  a  political  direction,  the  evolution  of  politics 
becomes  to  a  large  degree  the  barometer  of  the  whole  evolution 
of  the  race;  and  since  it  is  certain  that  in  trying  to  prophesy 
the  political  future  we  shall  leave  important  elements  of  this 
greater  evolution  out  of  the  reckoning,  it  is  also  certain  that 
revolutions  or  breaks  in  the  imaginary  chain  of  political  develop- 
ment will  occur  to  surprise  the  "scientific"  observer. 

The  Russians  learned  the  danger  of  the  old  political  thinking 
from  their  own  experience.  The  Government  through  its 
prime  ministers  endeavours  to  promote  such  "scientific"  think- 
ing. As  soon  as  the  Government  can  succeed  in  polarising  the 
popular  thought,  and  concentrating  the  public  attention  on  any 
two  extremes,  it  is  easy  to  persuade  it  that  both  are  to  be 
avoided.  As  soon  as  the  people  are  divided  into  two 
camps,  even  in  discussion,  while  the  timid  elements  of,  the 
community  are  situated  between,  the  Government  can  step 
in,  and  taking  advantage  of  the  chaos,  itself  induce  some 
principle    of    that   unity    which    every    society    imperatively 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  447 

demands.  When  it  can  stir  up  such  a  spiritual  conflict  it  is 
as  if  the  Government  had  itself  ordered  the  placing  of  the 
enemy's  forces.  Unity  there  must  be;  if  in  the  chaos  of 
competition  of  American  industry,  it  is  a  great  economic  unit, 
a  trust,  that  introduces  the  new  and  necessary  unity,  to  the 
economic  subjection  of  the  people;  if  in  Russia, it  is  the  Czarism 
that  steps  in  to  restore  the  balance  in  race  struggles  and  social 
conflicts  it  has  itself  encouraged,  replacing  by  an  artificial  and 
violent  unity  the  revolutionary  Socialist  unity  for  which  the 
nation  is  striving. 

If  in  Russia  it  is  the  Government  that  takes  advantage  of  the 
division  in  the  thought  of  the  individual,  it  is  the  moderate 
party  that  is  now  trying  to  make  use  of  this  old  and  crude 
dualistic  manner  of  political  thought  in  order  to  put  an  end  to 
the  revolutionary  movement.  Contending,  like  Witte,  that 
there  are  no  interruptions  in  political  evolution,  the  philosophers 
of  Russia's  moderate  party  and  of  the  conservative  wing  of  the 
Marxian  Socialists  as  well,  deny  the  possibility  of  revolutionary 
political  changes,  assume  a  legal  or  constitutional  regime  even 
before  it  exists,  obey  the  present  Government,  and  wear  out 
their  souls  in  vain  working  for  the  smallest  beginning  of  a  real 
constitution.  The  moderates'  dualistic  attitude  toward  life, 
their  separation  of  science  and  the  human  soul,  was  recently 
expressed  by  the  well  known  writer  Berydaiev  when  he  said: 
"We  desire  a  neutral  social  development,  the  freeing  of  human- 
ity and  the  lifting  of  it  out  of  animal  state,  but  not  the  trans- 
forming of  social  visions  and  dreams  into  a  religion;  for  with  a 
neutral  sphere  we  can  make  our  religion  harmonise."  But  for 
the  Socialist  Christians  or  almost  religious  Socialists  of  the  type 
that  is  dominating  in  Russia  to-day,  whether  a  Father  Petrov 
or  a  Maxim  Gorky,  it  is  precisely  these  social  dreams  and 
passions  that  must  be  transformed  into  a  religion  and  a  social 
faith,  and  it  is  this  social  faith  that  constitutes  the  essence  of  all 
the  deepest  human  thought  and  feeling,  whether  we  call  it  religion 
or  something  else.  Socialism  as  a  purely  political  or  economic 
doctrine  can  be  opposed  to  a  well  harmonised  purely  political 
religious  creed  as  Berydaiev  suggests,  but  to  the  new  revolu- 
tionary Russians  there  can  be  no  contradictions  between 
Socialism  and  religion,  or  one's  social  and  personal  creed.     To- 


448  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

divide  life  into  science  and  matters  of  the  soul  is  for  the  Russians 
of  to-day  as  much  crime  as  it  was  to  Rousseau  or  his  followers 
in  the  great  revolution  of  France,  who  lived  and  breathed  their 
social  faith  before  they  preached  it  to  mankind. 

Ill 

One  of  Russia's  brilliant  political  writers,  Bulgakov,  demands 
in  the  name  of  Russian  public  opinion  that  the  political  party 
of  the  future  should  be  a  religious  party  in  the  broadest  meaning 
of  the  term,  including  even  a  certain  kind  of  atheism  as  a 
religious  force. 

In  the  true  conception  he  claims  every  political  party  should 
constitute  a  single  spiritual  whole,  should  have  a  common 
soul,  a  common  thought,  a  common  will,  should  be  literally  a 
collective  organism.  The  object  of  the  religious  political  party 
he  says  should  be  **to  participate  in  social  and  political  life 
with  the  object  of  transforming  it  in  equal  spirit  of  love,  liberty, 
equality,  and  fraternity.  Sooner  or  later  there  must  arise  in 
our  midst  a  purely  Christian  party  absolutely  alien  to  clericalism, 
obscurantism,  and  other  spectres  of  the  past,  but  inspired  by 
great  faith  and  in  the  name  of  this  faith  by  ideals  of  democracy 
and  Socialism."  In  these  terms  a  devoted  Christian  is  express- 
ing a  feeling  that  is  common  to  all  parts  of  the  Russian  people. 
Whether  we  hear  speaking  the  radical  Petrov  or  the  conservative 
Bulgakov,  the  Christian  anarchist  Tolstoi  or  the  communist 
anarchist  Kropotkin,  we  have  a  common  instance  of  the  fusion 
of  social  and  religious  faith.  Among  the  political  Socialists  and 
the  great  popular  and  Socialistic  parties  that  are  taking  hold 
of  the  masses,  we  hear  often  the  same  cry,  or  still  more  often 
the  simple  demand,  that  Socialism  raised  to  the  height  of  a 
religious  conception  should  become  the  faith  of  mankind. 

These  individuals  and  parties  say  that  faith  like  this  is  not 
mystic;  that  their  religion  is  no  theological  abstraction;  it 
resembles  rather  the  high  rationalistic  faith  of  Tolstoi.  In 
Tolstoi's  creed  religion  must  inspire  all  individual  and  social 
morality,  but  this  religion  we  find  is  based  on  a  simple  and 
rational  conception  of  brotherly  love,  the  desire  to  do  to  others 
as  we  would  have  others  do  unto  us.     Even  the  philosophy  of 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  449 

Comte,  Tolstoi  classes  with  religions  which  he  defines  as  efforts 
to  establish  the  relation  of  man  to  the  world  and  its  principle. 
God  is  the  principle  of  the  world,  but  the  will  of  God  is  to  bring 
about  the  welfare  of  man,  the  end  of  religion  is  social  service. 
The  end  of  society,  on  the  other  hand,  is  God.  "For  man, 
through  man,  to  God,"  is  Tolstoi's  latest  formulation  of  his 
social  creed.     But  God's  will  is  the  spiritual  welfare  of  mankind. 

The  religion  of  all  who  make  their  individual  belief  also  a 
social  faith  is  necessarily  of  a  highly  revolutionary  order. 
Tolstoi's  religion,  for  instance,  teaches  above  all  independence, 
it  leads  to  both  a  spiritual  and  practical  anarchism.  So  clearly 
is  this  true  that  we  doubt  if  under  our  anarchist  law,  Tolstoi, 
any  more  than  his  friend.  Prince  Kropotkin,  could  be  admitted 
into  the  United  States,  for  Tolstoi  not  only  speaks  of  the  sub- 
mission to  human  power  as  a  sin,  but  preaches  openly  and 
clearly,  like  our  great  Thoreau,  that  nobody  ought  to  submit 
to  any  government.  He  says  repeatedly,  as  he  also  made  clear 
in  our  personal  talk,  that  he  agrees  in  large  part  with  the  leading 
anarchists,  Thoreau,  Bakounin,  Kropotkin,  Proudhon  and 
the  rest. 

But  the  social  faith  of  the  majority  of  Russians  has  no  direct 
relation  with  any  religious  creed;  it  is  inspired  with  the  depth 
of  feeling  and  faith  that  characterises  religious  thought,  rather 
than  with  its  intellectual  formulation.  Tolstoi  and  most  of 
the  revolutionists  who  have  received  their  inspiration  rather 
from  religion  than  from  the  social  situation  itself,  are  inclined 
to  favour  a  non-political  and  inactive  verbal  attack  on 
the  existing  regime;  whereas  the  revolutionists  who  have 
obtained  their  ideas  largely  from  the  struggle  itself,  believe  not 
only  in  a  militant  activity  but  in  martyrdom  for  the  cause. 
Both  are  equally  revolutionary  in  what  they  teach,  but  it  is 
only  the  political  Socialists  that  are  revolutionary  in  action. 

There  are  only  two  courses  to  humanity  in  the  minds  of 
most  honest  and  intelligent  Russians.  We  must  either  defend 
our  principles  against  the  universe  to  the  last  drop  of  our  blood, 
as  the  majority  of  the  Socialists  demand,  or  with  Tolstoi  we 
must  abandon  social  as  opposed  to  individual  progress,  surren- 
der all  claims  to  the  exercise  of  our  physical  energy  in  behalf 
of  our  principles,  and  become  with  him  non-resistant  to  evil. 


450  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

We  must  either  devote  ourselves  whole-heartedly  and  aggres- 
sively to  the  service  of  our  conception  of  the  welfare  of  society, 
whatever  it  may  be,  and  so  hope  also  for  the  best  possible  devel- 
opment of  each  of  society's  members,  or  we  must  devote  our- 
selves first  of  all  to  our  own  perfecting  and  expect  with  Tolstoi 
that  the  best  social  results  will  follow.  We  must  either  make 
the  great  social  cause  the  first  business  of  each  of  us,  as  Maeter- 
linck has  lately  so  brilliantly  urged,  or  beginning  at  the  other 
end  we. must  first  socialise  the  individual  with  Tolstoi.  In 
either  case  we  find  a  religious  ideal  that  gives  equal  account 
to  the  individual  and  society,  that  re-creates  the  individual 
and  gives  hini  a  chance  through  social  service  to  feel  at  home 
in  the  world  and  at  one  with  the  race. 

I  have  traced  briefly  the  social  principles  that  the  Russians 
are  dying  for,  I  have  shown  the  new  conception  of  life  itself 
that  is  arising  out  of  the  revolution  of  social  ideas.  Russia 
has  to  offer  the  world  something  far  greater  even  than  a  better 
and  truer  social  philosophy  or  a  larger  conception  and  feeling 
about  life;  she  is  raising  a  new  goal  for  all  human  endeavour. 
No  Russian  would  consider  it  a  misfortune  that  Maeterlinck  and 
not  one  of  their  own  compatriots  has  best  expressed  this  imagina- 
tive striving  after  a  social  goal  that  lay  beyond  our  own  compre- 
hension, for  Russians,  as  has  been  said  at  the  beginning,  are 
international,  not  merely  patriotic  in  their  feelings,  and  inter- 
national above  all  in  their  ready  assimilation  of  the  world's 
best  thoughts. 

Maeterlinck,  who  after  Tolstoi  is  perhaps  the  most  popular 
of  all  living  serious  writers,  has  seized  the  very  soul  of  this 
revolutionary  nation;  indeed,  we  can  have  little  doubt  that  he 
had  the  great  revolutionary  movement  of  the  times  in  mind 
when  he  wrote  his  brilliant  essay  on  "Our  Social  Duty." 

"What  are  we  to  do  in  the  present  state  of  society?"  asks 
the  great  Belgian,  and  answers  that  there  can  be  no  question 
about  destroying  it.  The  most  spiritual  argument  against  over- 
throwing the  present  society  is,  he  thinks,  that  of  those  who 
ask  only  for  a  few  years  of  respite  on  the  ground  that  the  great 
social  question,  with  the  onward  march  of  science,  will  solve 
itself  and  render  useless  all  the  difficult  sacrifices  that  justice 
now  demands  of  men;  but  he  denies  this  argument  and  refuses 


RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE  451 

this  respite.      Man  must  fulfil  his  organic  duty,  he  says;  he 
must  play  the  r61e  written  for  him  by  nature.     He  writes: 

Humanity  has  appointed  us  to  gather  that  which  stands  on  the  horizon. 
It  has  given  us  instructions  which  it  does  not  behoove  us  to  discuss.  It 
distributes  its  forces  as  it  thinks  right.  At  every  crossway  on  the  road 
that  leads  to  the  future,  it  has  placed,  against  each  of  us,  ten  thousand 
men  to  guard  the  past ;  let  us  therefore  have  no  fear  lest  the  fairest  towers 
of  former  days  be  insufficiently  defended.  We  are  only  too  naturally 
inclined  to  temporise,  to  shed  tears  over  inevitable  ruins;  this  is  the 
greatest  of  our  trespasses     . 

Let  us  not  say  to  ourselves  that  the  best  truth  always  lies  in  moderation, 
in  the  fair  average.  This  would  perhaps  be  so  if  the  majority  of  men  did 
not  think,  did  not  hope,  upon  a  much  lower  plane  than  is  needful.  That 
is  why  it  behooves  the  others  to  think  and  hope  upon  a  higher  plane 
than  seems  reasonable.  The  average,  the  fair  moderation  of  to-day, 
will  be  the  least  human  of  things  to-morrow.  At  the  time  of  the  Spanish 
Inquisition,  the  opinion  of  good  sense  and  of  the  just  medium  was  cer- 
tainly that  people  ought  not  to  burn  too  large  a  number  of  heretics; 
extreme  and  unreasonable  opinion  obviously  demanded  that  they  should 
bum  none  at  all.  It  is  the  same  to-day  with  the  question  of  marriage, 
of  love,  of  religion,  of  criminal  justice,  and  so  on.  Has  not  mankind  yet 
lived  long  enough  to  realise  that  it  is  always  the  extreme  idea,  that  is  J  / 
the  highest  idea,  the  idea  at  the  summit  of  thought,  that  is  right?  At 
the  present  moment,  the  most  reasonable  opinion  on  the  subject  of  our 
social  question  invites  us  to  do  all  that  we  can  gradually  to  diminish 
inevitable  inequalities  and  distribute  happiness  more  equitably.  Extreme 
opinion  demands  instantly  integral  division,  the  suppression  of  property, 
obligatory  labour,  and  the  rest.  We  do  not  yet  know  how  these  demands 
will  be  realised;  but  it  is  already  quite  certain  that  very  simple  circum- 
stances will  one  day  make  them  appear  as  natural  as  the  suppression  of 
the  right  of  primogeniture  or  of  the  privileges  of  the  nobility.  It  is 
important,  in  these  questions  of  the  dtiration  of  a  species  and  not  of  a 
people  or  an  individual,  that  we  should  not  limit  ourselves  to  the  experi- 
ence of  history.  What  it  confirms  and  what  it  denies  moves  in  an 
insignificant  circle.  The  truth,  in  this  case,  lies  much  less  in  our  reason, 
which  is  always  turned  toward  the  past,  than  in  our  imagination,  which 
sees  further  than  the  future     .     .     . 

Let  us  listen  only  to  the  experience  that  urges  us  on:  it  is  always 
higher  than  that  which  throws  or  keeps  us  back.  Let  us  reject  all  the 
counsels  of  the  past  that  do  not  turn  us  toward  the  future.  This  is 
what  was  admirably  understood,  perhaps  for  the  first  time  in  history, 
by  certain  men  of  the  French  Revolution ;  and  that  is  why  this  revolution 
is  the  one  that  did  the  greatest  and  the  most  lasting  things.  Here,  this 
experience  teaches  us  that,  contrary  to  all  that  occurs  in  the  affairs  of 
daily  life,  it  is  above  all  important  to  destroy.  In  every  social  progress 
the  great  and  the  only  difficult  work  is  the  destruction  of  the  past 


452  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

And  let  us  not  fear  that  we  may  go  too  fast.  If,  at  certain  hours,  we 
seem  to  be  rushing  at  a  headlong  and  dangerous  pace,  this  is  to  counter- 
balance unjustifiable  delays  and  to  make  up  for  time  lost  during  centuries 
of  inactivity. 

We  are  certain  that  almost  to  a  man  all  the  great  parties 
and  individuals  that  are  driving  forward  Russia's  great  revolu- 
tionary movement  could  sign  this  confession  of  faith.  Nearly 
all  have  seen  in  the  life  around  them  not  only  the  evolutionary, 
but  the  revolutionary,  truths ;  nearly  all  value  the  life  of  the  com- 
ing generations  more  than  they  do  that  of  the  months  and  years 
in  which  they  happen  to  be  living ;  nearly  all  are  listening  only  to 
the  higher  experience  and  are  following  the  greater  expediency. 
None  have  the  belittling  fear  that  society  may  go  too  fast.  To 
them  as  to  Maeterlinck  social  duty  is  a  religious  faith. 

The  Russians  have  not  an  over-confident  nature,  and  this 
is  why  in  their  great  crisis  they  have  studied  so  carefully,  so 
sympathetically  and  profoundly  the  histories  and  literature  of 
all  other  countries  to  find  if  there  is  not  a  great  and  helpful 
truth  that  can  aid  Russia  now.  They  have  found  many  such 
truths  and  made  them  their  own,  and  it  is  because  of  their  open- 
mindedness  and  sympathy  that  they  have  now  rather  to  teach 
humanity  than  to  learn  from  it,  and  that  the  world  is  listening 
for  their  message.  For  a  generation  and  more,  especially  during 
the  last  few  years,  they  have  been  hearing  and  assimilating  the 
world's  best  thought  and  experience  —  as  no  people  that  ever 
went  before  them.  Maeterlinck's  stirring  appeal  to  social  revolu- 
tion is  not  received  as  it  is  in  other  countries  as  new,  startling, 
and  sensational,  but  rather  as  a  perfectly  accurate  and  true 
expression  of  what  the  Russians  already  feel.  And  this  is 
Russia's  message  —  not  the  words  of  any  individual,  not  the 
principles  of  any  party,  but  the  daily  thoughts  and  feelings  and 
actions  of  a  people  ready  to  die  for  what  they  think  and  feel ; 
a  message  involved  in  every  living  speech  or  writing,  in  every 
great  deed,  a  message  that  goes  out  from  Russia  to  travel 
around  the  world,  to  become  implanted  and  to  take  root  among 
all  peoples  and  individuals  that  deserve  and  will  win  a  share  in 
the  new  civilisatioa  of  which  the  Russian  Revolution  is  perhaps 
the  dawn. 


APPENDIX 
AND  BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 


NOTE  A 

THE    BASIS    FOR    RUSSIA'S    CONSTITUTIONAL    ILLUSIONS 

THE    czar's    MANIFESTO    OF    OCTOBER    I7,    I905.         (OCTOBER    30, 
1905 WESTERN    calendar) 

We,  Nicholas  IL,  by  God's  Grace  Emperor  and  Autocrat 
of  all  the  Russias,  Czar  of  Poland,  Grand  Duke  of  Finland, 
and  so  forth,  announce  to  our  loyal  subjects:  The  disturbances 
and  movements  in  oiu*  principal  cities  and  numerous  other 
places  in  our  realm  fill  our  heart  with  great  and  intense  anguish. 
The  happiness  of  the  Russian  Ruler  is  inseparably  bound  with  the 
happiness  of  the  people  and  the  pain  of  the  people  is  the  pain  of 
the  Ruler.  From  the  present  conditions  there  may  arise  a  deep 
national  disturbance  and  danger  for  the  integrity  and  unity 
of  our  empire. 

The  high  duty  of  our  mission  as  Ruler  compels  us  to  bestir 
ourselves  with  our  whole  might  and  power  to  hasten  the 
cessation  of  these  disorders  that  are  so  dangerous  for  the  State. 

While  we  have  ordered  the  proper  officials  to  take  measures 
to  allay  the  direct  manifestations  of  disorder,  riots  and  deeds 
of  violence  and  for  the  protection  of  the  peaceful  population 
which  is  striving  to  quietly  fulfil  all  of  the  duties  imposed 
upon  it,  we  have  at  the  same  time  recognised  it  as  indispensable 
in  order  to  accomplish  successfully  the  general  measures  for 
the  calming  of  public  life  to  give  to  the  activity  of  the  highest 
officials  of  the  Government  a  unified  direction.  We  obligate 
the  Government  to  fulfil  our  unchangeable  will  as  follows: 

1.  The  population  is  to  be  given  the  inviolable  foundation  of 
civil  rights  based  on  the  actual  inviolability  of  the  person, 
freedom  of  belief,  of  speech,  of  organisation,  and  meeting. 

2.  Without  interrupting  the  elections  already  ordered  for  the 
State  Duma  and  as  far  as  the  shortness  of  the  time  at  our 
disposition  for  the  calling  of  the  first  Duma  allows  —  such  classes 

455 


4S6  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

of  the  population  which  are  now  altogether  shut  out  from  the 
right  of  suffrage,  are  to  be  called  to  participate  in  the  Duma, 
upon  which  the  working  out  of  the  principle  of  universal  suffrage 
will  be  left  to  the  new  legislative  body. 

3.  As  an  unchangeable  principle  it  is  declared  that  no  law 
can  be  put  into  effect  without  the  consent  of  the  Duma  of  the 
State  and  that  the  elected  representatives  of  the  population 
will  be  guaranteed  the  possibility  of  an  effective  share  in  the 
revision  of  the  legality  of  the  commands  of  officials  appointed 
by  us. 

We  rely  on  all  true  sons  of  Russia  to  reflect  concerning  their 
duty  to  the  Fatherland  to  work  together  for  the  cessation  of 
the  present  unheard  of  disturbances  of  order,  and  to  place 
all  their  powers  along  with  ourselves  at  the  disposal  of  the 
Cause  of  the  restoration  of  order  and  peace  in  the  Fatherland. 
Given  at  Peterhof  on  the  17th  October,  1905,  in  the  eleventh 
year  of  om-  reign. 

(Signed)  Nicholas. 


NOTE  B 

THE  REPLY  OF  THE  FIRST  DUMA  TO  THE  SPEECH  FROM  THE  THRONE 

MAY,    1906 

Your  Majesty: 

In  a  speech  addressed  to  the  representatives  of  the  people 
it  pleased  your  Majesty  to  announce  your  resolution  to  keep 
unchanged  the  decree  by  which  the  people  were  assembled  to 
carry  out  legislative  functions  in  co6peration  with  their 
Monarch.  The  State  Duma  sees  in  this  solemn  promise  of  the 
Monarch  to  the  people  a  lasting  pledge  for  the  strengthening 
and  the  further  development  of  legislative  procedure  in  strict 
conformity  with  constitutional  principles.  The  State  Duma,, 
on  its  side,  will  direct  all  its  efforts  toward  perfecting  the 
principles  of  national  representation  and  will  present  for  your 
Majesty's  confirmation  a  law  for  national  representation,  based 
in  accordance  with  the  manifest  will  of  the  people,  upon 
principles  of  universal  suffrage. 

Your  Majesty's  summons  to  us  to  cooperate  in  a  work  which 
shall  be  useful  to  the  country  finds  an  echo  in  the  hearts  of  all 
the  members  of  the  State  Duma.  The  State  Duma,  made  up 
of  representatives  of  all  classes  and  all  races  inhabiting  Russia,, 
is  united  in  a  warm  desire  to  regenerate  Russia  and  to  create 
within  her  a  new  order,  based  upon  the  peaceful  cooperation  of 
all  classes  and  races,  upon  the  firm  foundation  of  civic  liberty. 

But  the  State  Duma  deems  it  its  duty  to  declare  that  while 
prese^it  conditions  exist  such  reformation  is  impossible. 

The  country  recognises  that  the  ulcer  in  our  present  regime 
is  in  the  arbitrary  power  of  officials  who  stand  between  the 
Czar  and  the  people,  and  seized  with  a  common  impulse  the 
coimtry  has  loudly  declared  that  reformation  is  possible  only 
upon  the  basis  of  freedom  of  action  and  the  participation  by 
the  nation  itself  in  the  exercise  of  the  legislative  power  and 
the  control  of  the  executive.    In  the  Manifesto  of  October  17,. 

457 


458  RUSSIA'S   MESSAGE 

1905,  your  Majesty  was  pleased  to  announce  from  the  summit 
of  the  throne  a  firm  determination  to  employ  these  very 
principles  as  the  foundation  for  Russia's  future,  and  the  entire 
nation  hailed  these  good  tidings  with  a  universal  cry  of  joy. 

Yet  the  very  first  days  of  freedom  were  darkened  by  the 
heavy  affliction  into  which  the  country  was  thrown  by  those 
who  would  bar  the  path  leading  to  the  Czar;  those  who  by 
trampling  down  the  very  fundamental  principles  of  the  imperial 
Manifesto  of  October  17,  1905,  overwhelmed  the  land  with  the 
disgrace  of  organised  massacres,  military  reprisals,  and 
imprisonments   without   trial. 

The  impression  of  these  recent  administrative  acts  has  been 
felt  so  keenly  by  the  people  that  no  pacification  of  the  country 
is  possible  until  the  people  are  assured  that  henceforth  arbitrary 
acts  of  officials  shall  cease,  nor  be  longer  shielded  by  the  name 
of  your  Majesty ;  until  all  the  ministers  shall  be  held  responsible 
to  the  representatives  of  the  people  and  that  the  administration 
in  each  step  of  State  service  shall  be  reformed  accordingly. 

Sire:  The  idea  of  completely  freeing  the  Monarch  from 
responsibility  can  be  implanted  in  the  mind  of  the  nation  only 
by  making  the  ministers  responsible  to  the  people.  Only 
a  ministry  fully  trusted  by  the  majority  of  the  Duma  can 
establish  confidence  in  the  Government ;  and  only  in  the  presence 
of  such  confidence  is  the  peaceful  and  regular  work  of  the 
State  Duma  possible.  But  above  all  it  is  most  needful  to  free 
Russia  from  the  operation  of  exceptional  laws  for  so-called 
''special  and  extraordinary  protection,"  and  "martial  law," 
under  cover  of  which  the  arbitrary  authority  of  irresponsible 
officials  has  grown  up  and  still  continues  to  grow. 

Side  by  side  with  the  establishment  of  the  principle  of 
responsibility  of  the  administration  to  the  representatives 
of  the  people,  it  is  indispensable,  for  the  successful  work  of 
"the  Duma,  that  there  should  be  implanted,  and  definitely 
adopted,  the  fundamental  principle  of  popular  representation 
based  on  the  cooperation  of  the  Monarch  with  the  people,  as 
the  only  source  of  legislative  power.  Therefore  all  barriers 
between  the  Imperial  power  and  the  people  must  be  removed. 
No  branch  of  legislative  power  should  ever  be  closed  to  the 
inspection  of  the  representative  of  the  people,   in  cooperation 


APPENDIX  45^ 

with  the  Monarch.  The  State  Duma  considers  it  its  duty 
to  state  to  your  Majesty,  in  the  name  of  the  people,  that  the 
whole  nation,  with  true  inspiration  and  energy,  with  genuine 
faith  in  the  near  prosperity  of  the  country,  will  only  then 
fulfil  its  work  of  reformation,  when  the  Council  of  State, 
which  stands  between  it  and  the  throne,  shall  cease  to  be  made 
up,  even  in  part,  of  members  who  have  been  appointed  instead 
of  being  elected;  when  the  law  of  collecting  taxes  shall  be 
subject  to  the  will  of  the  representatives  of  the  people;  and 
when  there  shall  be  no  possibility,  by  any  special  enactment, 
of  limiting  the  legislative  jurisdiction  of  the  representatives 
of  the  people.  The  State  Duma  also  considers  it  inconsistent 
with  the  vital  interests  of  the  people  that  any  bill  imposing 
taxes,  when  once  passed  by  the  Dtmia,  should  be  subject  to 
amendment  on  the  part  of  any  body  which  is  not  representative 
of  the  mass  of  tax-payers. 

In  the  domain  of  its  future  legislative  activity  the  State  Duma, 
performing  the  duty  definitely  imposed  upon  it  by  the  peo- 
ple, deems  it  necessary  to  provide  the  country,  without  delay, 
with  a  strict  law  providing  for  the  inviolability  of  the  per- 
son, freedom  of  conscience,  liberty  of  speech,  freedom  of  the 
press,  freedom  of  association,  convinced  that  without  the  strict 
observance  of  these  principles,  the  foundation  of  which  was 
laid  in  the  Manifesto  of  October  17,  1905,  no  social  reform  can 
be  realised.  The  Duma  also  considers  it  necessary  to  secure 
for  all  citizens  the  right  of  petition  to  the  people's  representatives. 
The  State  Duma  has  further  the  inflexible  conviction  that 
neither  liberty  nor  order  can  be  made  firm  and  secure  except  on 
the  broad  foundation  of  equality  before  the  law  of  all  citizens 
without  exception.  Therefore  the  State  Duma  will  establish 
a  law  for  the  perfect  equality  before  the  law  of  all  citizens, 
abolishing  all  limitations  dependent  upon  estate,  nationality, 
religion  and  sex.  The  Duma,  however,  while  striving  to  free 
the  country  from  the  binding  fetters  of  administrative  guardian- 
ship and  leaving  the  limitation  of  the  liberty  of  the  citizen  to 
the  independent  judicial  authorities,  still  deems  the  application 
of  capital  punishment,  even  in  accordance  with  a  legal  sentence, 
as  inadmissible.  A  death  sentence  should  never  be  pronounced. 
The  Duma  holds  that  it   has  the   right   to  proclaim,   as  the 


4ek>  RUSSIA'S  MESSAGE 

unanimous  desire  of  the  people,  that  a  day  should  come  when  a 
law  forever  abolishing  capital  punishment  here  shall  be  estab- 
lished. In  anticipation  of  that  law  the  country  to-day  is  looking 
to  your  Majesty  for  a  suspension  of  all  death  sentences. 

The  investigation  of  the  needs  of  the  rural  population  and  the 
undertaking  of  legislative  measures  to  meet  those  wants  will 
be  considered  among  the  first  problems  of  the  State  Duma. 
The  most  numerous  part  of  the  population,  the  hard  working 
peasants,  impatiently  await  the  satisfaction  of  their  acute  want 
of  land  and  the  first  Russian  State  Duma  would  be  recreant 
to  its  duty  were  it  to  fail  to  establish  a  law  to  meet  this  primary 
want  by  resorting  to  the  use  of  lands  belonging  to  the  State, 
the  Crown,  the  royal  family,  and  monastic  and  Church  lands; 
also  private  landed  property  on  the  principle  of  the  law  of 
eminent  domain. 

The  Duma  also  deems  it  necessary  to  create  laws  giving 
equality  to  the  peasantry,  removing  the  present  degrading 
limitations  which  separate  them  from  the  rest  of  the  people. 
The  Duma  considers  the  needs  of  working  people  as  pressing, 
and  that  there  should  be  legislative  measures  taken  for  the 
protection  of  hired  labour.  The  first  step  in  that  direction 
ought  to  be  to  give  freedom  to  the  hired  labourer  in  all  branches 
of  work,  freedom  to  organise,  freedom  to  act  and  to  secure 
his  material  and  spiritual  welfare. 

The  Duma  will  also  deem  it  its  duty  to  employ  all  its  forces 
in  raising  the  standard  of  intelligence,  and  above  all  it  will 
occupy  itself  in  framing  laws  for  free  and  general  education. 

Along  with  the  aforementioned  measures  the  Duma  will  pay 
special  attention  to  the  just  distribution  of  the  burden  of  taxa- 
tion, unjustly  imposed  at  present  upon  the  poorer  classes  of 
inhabitants ;  and  to  the  reasonable  expenditure  of  the  means 
of  the  State.  Not  less  vital  in  legislative  work  will  be  a  funda- 
mental reform  of  local  government  and  of  self-government, 
extending  the  latter  to  all  the  inhabitants  upon  the  principles 
of  universal  suffrage. 

Bearing  in  mind  the  heavy  burden  imposed  upon  the  people 
by  your  Majesty's  army  and  navy,  the  Duma  will  secure  princi- 
ples of  right  and  justice  in  those  branches  of  the  service. 

Finally,  the  Duma  deems  it  necessary  to  point  out  as  one  of 


APPENDIX  461 

the  problems  pressing  for  solution  the  long-crying  demands 
of  the  different  nationalities.  Russia  is  an  empire  inhabited 
by  many  different  races  and  nationalities.  Their  spiritual 
tmion  is  possible  only  by  meeting  the  needs  of  each  one  of  them, 
and  by  preserving  and  developing  their  national  characteristics. 
The  Duma  will  try  to  satisfy  those  reasonable  wants. 

Your  Majesty :  On  the  threshold  of  our  work  stands  one 
question  which  agitates  the  soul  of  the  whole  nation ;  and  which 
agitates  us,  the  chosen  and  elected  of  the  people,  and  which 
deprives  us  of  the  possibility  of  undisturbedly  proceeding 
toward  the  first  part  of  our  legislative  activity.  The  first  word 
uttered  by  the  State  Duma  met  with  cries  of  sympathy  from  the 
whole  Duma.  It  was  the  word  amnesty.  The  country  thirsts 
for  amnesty,  to  be  extended  to  all  those  whose  offences  were 
the  result  of  either  religious  or  political  convictions;  and  all 
persons  implicated  in  the  agrarian  movement.  These  are 
demands  of  the  national  conscience  which  cannot  be  overlooked ; 
the  fulfilment  of  which  cannot  be  longer  delayed.  Sire,  the 
Duma  expects  of  you  full  political  amnesty  as  the  first  pledge  of 
mutual  understanding  and  mutual  agreement  between  the  Czar 
and  his  people. 


NOTE  C 

THB     FIRST     NATIONAL   ASSEMBLY'S    DECLARATION    OP 
REVOLUTION 

THE  VIBORG  MANIFESTO.      JULY,   1906 

To  THE  People: 

The  Duma  has  been  dissolved  by  the  Ukase  of  the  8th  of  July. 
You  have  elected  us  as  your  representatives ;  you  have  elected 
us  and  you  have  given  us  instructions  to  struggle  for  land  and 
liberty.  According  to  your  instructions  and  to  our  duty  we 
have  drawn  up  these  laws  to  assure  liberty  to  the  people.  We 
have  demanded  the  resignation  of  irresponsible  ministers  who 
transgress  the  laws  with  immunity,  suppressing  freedom. 

But  first  of  all  we  wished  to  formulate  a  law  relative  to  the 
distribution  of  land  to  agricultural  labourers,  a  law  which 
demanded  the  division  for  this  purpose  of  the  lands  belonging  to 
the  Crown,  the  monasteries  and  the  clergy,  and  the  expropriation 
of  private  estates.  The  Government  considered  this  law  as 
inadmissible,  and  when  the  Duma  again  presented  its  resolution 
in  a  more  urgent  manner  on  this  subject  of  forced  expropriation 
the  Duma  was  dissolved. 

The  Government  promises  to  summon  a  new  Duma  in  seven 
months.  Russia  will  have  then  to  remain  for  seven  long  months 
without  a  people's  assembly  at  a  moment  when  the  population 
finds  itself  a  few  steps  from  ruin  and  when  industry  and 
commerce  are  tottering.  When  all  the  country  is  filled  with 
a  feverish  agitation  and  when  the  ministers  have  definitely 
shown  their  incapacity  to  do  justice  to  the  popular  needs. 

During  the  seven  months  the  Government  will  act  arbitrarily 
and  will  fight  against  the  popular  movement  to  obtain  a, pliant 
and  obedient  Duma.  If  it  should  succeed ,  however,  in  completely 
suppressing  the  popular  movement  the  Government  will  not 
convoke  the  Duma  at  all. 

462 


APPENDIX  463 

Citizens,  rise  for  the  defence  of  your  rights  to  a  popular 
assembly  which  are  being  trampled  under  foot  and  for  the 
defence  of  the  Duma.  Russia  must  not  remain  a  single  day 
without  popular  representation.  You  have  the  means  of 
procuring  this  representation.  The  Government  has  without 
the  consent  of  the  representations  of  the  people  no  right  to  levy 
taxes  on  the  people  nor  to  call  the  people  into  military  service. 
Consequently,  now  that  the  Duma  has  been  dissolved,  you  are 
fully  justified  in  giving  neither  money  nor  soldiers.  If,  however, 
the  Government  should  contract  loans  to  procure  an  income, 
these  loans  contracted  without  the  consent  of  your  popular 
representatives  are  null  and  void.  Russian  people  will  never 
recognise  them  and  it  will  not  feel  itself  called  upon  to  repay 
them.  As  a  consequence  until  the  popular  representatives  are 
called  together  do  not  give  a  kopeck  to  the  throne,  nor  soldiers 
to  the  army.  Be  firm  in  your  refusal.  No  power  can  resist 
the  united  and  inflexible  will  of  a  nation. 

Citizens,  in  this  obligatory  and  inevitable  struggle  your 
representatives  will  be  with  you. 


NOTE  D 

ONE   OF  THE   CZAR's   CONFESSIONS 

This  secret  document,  one  of  the  many  of  which  the  revo- 
lutionists have  stolen  a  copy,  shows  how  Russia  gets  her 
best,  most  accurate  and  irrefutable  knowledge  of  the  true 
character  and  statesmanship  of  her  Czar.  The  marginal  re- 
marks were  written  by  the  Czar's  own  hand.  The  report,  it  will  be 
noticed,  was  issued  just  before  the  close  of  the  Manchurian  war. 

Report  of  the  Controller  of  the  State  for  the  year  1904.  Dated 
6th  August,  I  go ^    N  ^41. 

1.  The  Controller  has  noticed  that  the  number  It  is  necessary 
and      quantity      of     the      materials,      ammunition, 
provisions,  etc.  in  the  Army  Corps  do  not  correspond 

to  the  standards  set  by  the  law.  The  Controller 
of  the  State  proposes  to  ask  the  Minister  of  War 
to  give  an  account  of  this  matter. 

2.  The    projectiles    manufactured    in    the    Perm  Sad  but  true 
workshops    according   to    the    specifications    of   the 

Krupp  Company  have  shown  a  poor  quality  during 
the  trials. 

3.  The  ammunition  of  the  5th  and  6th  Siberian  Difficult  to  believe 
Corps    are    altogether    exhausted.     In    one    of    the 

travelling  cars  they  have  not  been  renewed  since 
the  campaign  of  1877-78. 

4.  In  the  4th  Corps  the  winter  shoes  are  in  This  is  disgrace- 
fripfhtful  condition;  the  soles  are  made  from  ful;  how  many 
chips  of  wood  covered  with  strips  of  leather.  legs     have     been 

frozen  as  a  result  ? 

5.  The  financial  results  of  the  activity  of  the  It  is  time  to  or- 
State  workshops  in  the  Urals  are  very  disappointing,  ganise  the  State 
the  quantity  of  their  product  is  insufficient  and  workshops  of  the 
their  qualities  do  not  correspond  to  the  needs  of  the  Urals  in  a  manner 
Ministry  of  War.  to     render     them 

useful  to  the  State 

7.  The  construction  of  the  railway^s  of  the  State  (This   artide   was 
demands    enormous    sums.     The    principal     cause:  twice     underlined 
The  contractors  give  their  rights  to  other  persons,  by  the  Czar) 
receiving  20  to  40  per  cent,  for  having  conceded 
them. 

464 


APPENDIX  46s 

9.  The  Controller  thinks  that  the  management  This  is  the  way  it 
of  the  State  railways  gives  insufficient  results  seems  to  me  too 
because  the  members  of  the  Central  Administration 
who  receive  high  salaries  are  not  interested  in 
the  increase  of  the  railway  revenue.  He  proposes 
to  divide  the  salaries  into  two  parts,  first,  a  constant, 
second,  varying  according  to  the  increase  of  the 
railways. 


NOTE  E 

EXAMPLES  OF  AUTOCRATIC  LEGISLATION 

S.  Maruda,  in  the  Constitutional  Democratic  organ,  gives 
these  examples  of  the  delay  and  arbitrariness  of  "legislation" 
without  an  elected  assembly: 

In  1 88 1  was  begun  the  revision  of  the  criminal  laws.  At  length 
in  1903  the  new  code  was  finally  affirmed.  But  only  a  few 
sections,  those  differing  least  from  the  old  ones,  were  put  into 
execution. 

In  1882  the  civil  code  was  ordered  to  be  revised.  After 
twenty -two  years  the  work  had  not  gotten  further  than  a  project 
for  a  new  code. 

In  1 88 1  the  law  about  courts-martial  and  the  so-called  **  states'^ 
of  "strengthened"  and  "extraordinary"  defence  which  are 
almost  in  universal  use  as  supreme  over  all  civil  law  at  the 
present  moment,  was  first  "temporarily"  introduced  for  not 
longer  than  half  a  year  (an  apology  for  its  outrageous  character), 
then  extended  year  after  year  for  twenty-seven  years — to  the 
present  moment. 

In  1895,  perhaps  partly  as  the  result  of  George  Kennan's 
book,  the  Czar  ordered  a  revision  of  the  laws  about  exile.  After 
twelve  years  this  order  is  not  yet  completed,  and  has  just  been 
put  into  execution  in  its  uncompleted  form. 

The  laws  about  doctors  and  veterinaries  progressed  so  slowly 
that  before  their  completion  technical  changes  in  science  had 
made  them  obviously  absurd,  and  it  was  not  even  tried  to  put 
them  in  execution.  But  worst  of  all  was  the  fate  of  the  law 
that  was  necessary  above  all  others  to  prevent  corruption  — 
namely,  that  concerning  the  control  and  inspection  of  official 
expenditure. 

In  1866  began  the  work  of  gathering  material  for  a  new 
inspection  law.  Perhaps  this,  too,  was  partly  the  result  of  a 
book  —  Gogol's  satirical  masterpiece,    "The   Inspector,"  that 

466 


APPENDIX  467 

had  drawn  the  whole  world's  attention  to  the  almost  universal 
corruption  of  Russia's  official  caste.  With  great  pains  and 
trouble  the  project  was  at  last  written  out,  but  it  contained 
nothing  new.  Besides,  it  was  not  "approved,"  and  the 
controller  is  in  no  better  position  than  before  to  put  a  check 
to  the  bureaucratic  robbery.  Indeed  matters  are  worse,  for 
in  1862  the  minister  of  finance  was  deprived  of  the  right  of 
distributing  the  public  moneys  at  his  will,  according  to  one  or 
another  paragraph  of  the  laws,  while  this  year  the  minister, 
Kokovzev,  has  again  claimed  this  right. 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 

There  are  very  few  books  and  articles  bearing  directly  on 
the  present  Russian  situation  in  English,  French,  or  German. 
The  writer  has  not  made  a  very  thorough  search  but,  aside 
from  daily  papers,  especially  the  London  Tribune,  the  London 
Times,  and  Vorwdrts  of  Berlin,  and  the  Humanite  of  Paris, 
all  of  which  he  has  found  useful  —  he  has  discovered  almost 
nothing.  If  the  student  wishes  to  go  deeper,  he  must  either 
read  Russian  or  employ  a  translator.  In  either  case  he  would 
probably  be  obliged  also  to  transfer  his  labours  to  Russia, 
where  he  would  of  course  at  once  strike  an  enormous  literature. 
In  mentioning  the  few  works  and  articles  that  follow,  I  refer 
only  to  such  as  bear  directly  on  the  present  situation;  there 
is  a  much  more  abundant  literature  in  all  modem  languages 
on  conditions  that  existed  before  the  beginning  of  the  present 
revolutionary  movement. 

More  full  and  reliable  than  the  reports  to  be  obtained  from 
the  daily  papers  I  have  mentioned  have  been  the  frequent 
articles  of  VEuropeen  (defunct)  and  Le  Courier  Europeen 
of  Paris,  and  especially  of  the  Correspondance  Russe,  published 
at  Berlin,  London,  and  Paris  during  the  last  two  years  by  an 
important  group  of  Russian  liberals,  giving  in  a  brief  form  several 
times  a  week  invaluable  documents  and  statistical  information 
about  the  political  situation  and  the  revolutionary  movement. 

On  the  general  situation  the  only  book  of  first  rate  importance 

,  in  English,  French  or  German  is  the  work  of  Professor  Paul 

/f  Milyoukov,  "The  Russian  Crisis,"  which  describes  in  a  very 

V    satisfactory  way  the  situation  at  the  moment  at  the  beginning 

of    the    present    revolutionary    movement  in   1905.     Another 

interesting  general  work  (in  German)  is  "Russen  iiber  Russ- 

Vland,"  which  contains  articles  by  the  best  Russian  authorities 

on  many  phases  of  the  present  situation  —  as  for  example,  an 

article  by  Ozerov  on  finance,  by  Struve  on  politics,  by  Komilov 

on  the  peasants,  and  by  Amfiteatrov  on  the  women  of  Russia. 

468 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL   NOTE  469 

Two  books  in  partictilar  have  been  very  useful  to  me  in  their 
exposure  of  the  inner  workings  of  the  Government;  the  "Mem- 
oiren  eines  Russischen  Gouvemeurs"  by  Prince  Urussov,  and 
"Une  Page  de  la  Contre-Re volution  Russe"  by  Semenoff.  I 
believe  that  both  of  these  books  are  now  obtainable  in  English 
translations. 

On  the  economic  conditions  of  the  country,  there  is  a  group 
of  Russians  in  America  that  have  produced  their  numerous 
interesting  articles  in  our  scientific  and  popular  reviews.  The 
writers  of  these  articles,  Messrs.  Hourwich,  Simkhovitch,  and 
N.  I.  Stone,  are  known  as  authorities  on  these  questions  in  Russia 
as  well  as  in  the  United  States,  where  they  now  reside.  I  must  also 
mention  the  very  useful  monograph  of  the  United  States  Depart- 
ment of  Statistics  on  Commercial  Russia,  prepared  under  the  able 
governmental   statistician,  Jacobson,  also  a  Russian  by  birth. 

On  the  Russian  parties  themselves,  we  have  some  very 
interesting  publications  in  French.  For  several  years.  La 
Tribune  Russe  (  83  Rue  de  la  Sant^,  Paris)  has  given  full  monthly 
accounts  of  the  whole  Socialist  revolutionary  movement.  The 
Socialist  Revolutionary  Party  has  also  published  a  very  full 
report  for  the  last  International  Socialist  Congress  at  Stuttgart 
—  to  be  obtained  from  the  International  Socialist  Bureau  at 
Brussels.  Lastly,  I  recommend  the  reader  to  Prince  Kropot- 
kin's  able  work  in  English  on  Russian  Literature,  which  is  not 
only  the  best  book  we  have  on  the  subject,  but  also  shows  from  a 
passionately  sympathetic  standpoint  the  revolutionary  character 
of  Russian  literature  from  its  first  beginnings  about  a  century  ago. 

For  pictures  of  the  condition  during  the  recent  revolution- 
ary disturbances,  we  have  the  excellently  and  truthfully  written 
books  of  several  of  the  most  capable  correspondents.  Among 
these  are  **The  Dawn  in  Russia,"  by  Nevinson,  "The  Red 
Reign,"  by  Durland,  and  two  similar  works,  though  not  written 
by  correspondents,  "A  Year  in  Russia,"  by  Baring,  and  "Russia 
in  Revolution,"  by  Penis,  which  describe  the  revolutionary 
movement  just  at  the  moment  of  the  beginning  of  the  recent 
disturbances.  I  also  recommend  a  number  of  the  articles  in 
Collier's  and  Harper's  Weekly  by  Albert  Edwards  and  by  Harold 
Williams,  as  describing  accurately  and  from  a  broad  standpoint 
the  situation  during  the  heat  of  the  conflict. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


Absakov,   35 

Address  to  throne,  457 

Agrarian  uprisings,  1.^1,  265;  dis- 
order, 222;  incendiarism,  249; 
warfare,  255-258 

Agriculture,  81 ;  American  farming, 
138;  estates  of  nobility,  181; 
features  of,  182;  crisis  of,  211 

Aladdin,  28,  135,  228,  319;  in 
America,  311 

Alcohol  industry,  118,  236:  mo- 
nopoly of,  322 

Alexander  II.,  34,  35,  229 

Alexander    III.,     24 

Alexinsky,  229,  321,  369 

America,  35;  political  institutions 
of,    3;  wages,    190 

Andreief,  36 

Anikine,  209,  212,  335;  at  Inter- 
national Congress  in  London, 
432;  in    first    Duma,    329 

"Annals  of  a  Sportsman,"    195 

Appeal  of  October,    1905,    76 

Apraxin,  23,  8i 

Army,  262-267,  300-302  ;  common 
soldiers,  384;  mercenaries,  386; 
military  revolt,  385;  mutiny, 
362;  officers'  desertion  of,  383; 
recruits  sworn  against  Czar,  387; 
revolutionary    organisations   in, 

Austna,   105. 

Authors.  See  Andriev.Chisko,  Gorki, 
Korolenko,  Turgeniev, Tolstoi 

Autocracy,  11,  90,  129,  193;  con- 
stitutional government  versus, 
40;  legislation,  466  {See  also 
Czarism) 

Baltic    provinces,    23 

Bebel,  437 

Berdyaiev,     447 

Bessarabia,    26,   68 

Beveridge,      Senator,      book      on 

Russian  peasantry,  148,  149, 150 
Bibliography,   468 
Bielostock,  25,26;  pogrom  of,  47-50 
Bismarck,  niling  of  Prussia  in  1863, 

4x7 


Bobnnsky,  23,  93,  303 

Budberg,  389 

Budget,   107,   176 

Bulgakov,   conception  of  poKtical 

parties,  448 
Bureaucracy,      29,    38,     39,     103, 

105,    109;  anarchy   of,    58    {See 

also   Czarism). 

Cariyle,   8 

Catharine  II.,  34,   109,   193 

Caucasus,    28 

Censorship.     See    Press 

Charles   IX.,    27 

Church,  3,  4;  council,  395;  league 
of  workers  of  church  reform, 
396;  loyalty  of,  224.  {See  also 
Russian  Church,  origin  of) 

Clergy,   396 

Collapse  of  1903,  3 

Communal  ownership,  329,  330 

Commune,    332 

Communism,  159 

Constitution,  3,  40,  88 

Constitutional  Democratic  Party, 
92,  287,  297;  acts  against  its  own 
principle,  302;  mistake  of,  293; 
opportunity  of,  298;  severance 
of  unity,   288 

Constitutional  Democrats,  298; 
course  of,  276 ;  measures  adopted 
by,  225;  monarch  defence  of, 
135;  reforms  proposed,  211; 
social  reform,    208 

Cooperation.  See  Government 
coojjerative  stores 

Council  of  Labour,  217,  282;  pro- 
gramme of,  263 

Court,  37 

Crimean  war,   34,   115 

Crops,    84 

Czar,  4,  6,  31,  44,  50,  60,  63,  67; 
absolutism,  89 ;  chief  support  of, 
84;  common  people,  216; 
early  life  of,  21-23;  enmity 
to  Jews,  26;  lineage  of,  108; 
promises  of,  9,   11 

Czarism,  3,  61,  75,  85,  loi,  447; 
Duma,  47;  economic  failure  of» 


473 


474 


RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 


Czarism — Continued 

ii6;  members  of  court,  37; 
nature  of,  1 1 ;  opposition  to,  41, 
260,  423;  preservation  of,  39, 
40,  89;  pretentions  of,  182,  since 
dawn  of  history,  63 ;  support  of, 
17,  122 

Czar's  encouragement  of  massacre, 
52,  60;  Manifesto  of  October 
19,  1905,  455,  456;  statement 
concerning  the  Jews,  82;  tele- 
gram to  official  organ  of  League 
of  Russian  Men,    58 

Decembrists  of  1825,  428 
Deduline,    23 

Dolgorukov,  36,  84,  95,  273 
Doukhobors,    156 
Drink.  See  Alcohol  industry- 
Duma,    5,    44,    52,    89,    228,    271; 
centre  of  democratic  tendencies, 
392;  dissolution  of,  312;  Jewish 
members,  73 ;  landlords,  52 ;  peas- 
ants' demands,  215 
Duma,    first,    16,    208,    228,    329; 
unity    of,    278,     279.     (See  also 
Address  to  throne) 
Duma,  second,  282,  285,  3 29;  consti- 
tutional assembly,  315.  (See  also 
Stolypine  and  Zeretelly) 
Duma,    third,     68,    72,    134,    273, 
332,    budget,    294;  drink    prob- 
lem,   323;    elections,     325;    ele- 
ments of,   292;  purpose  of,  307 

Education,     321,     462.     (See  also 

Masses) 
Election  law,  108, 128,  312,  324,  325 
Emancipation  of  serfs,    137,    192. 

(See  also  Landlords'  gain) 
Exports,  121,  178,  186 
Expropriation,  67,  211 

Famine,  122,  177,  178 

Farming,  180,  186;  implements,  183 

Finland,  89 

Finns,  26 

"For  Czar  and  Fatherland,"  54 

Foreign  loans,  12,  115,  300;  cred- 
itors, 124;  international  rela- 
tions, 416 

Foreign  newspapers,    145 

France,  8,   15,  422 

Freedom  of  speech,  462 

French  Revolution,  7,  34,  421 

Greneral  strike,  9,  13,  217,  272; 
railway,  349 


George  IIL  of  England,  100 

Germany,  106 

Gershuni,  326 

"Globe,"  311 

Gorki,  36,  413 

Government,  126,  127,  227,  263, 
264;  bureaus,  38;  campaigns  of, 
71;  constitutional,  40;  coopera- 
tive stores,  36;  despotism,  31; 
financial  position  of,  123;  pres- 
ent degradation  of,  181;  small 
landowners,  333;  trade  unions, 
361;  war  waged  against,   374 

Grand  dukes,   11,  25 

Guerilla  warfare,  359,  368;  peas- 
ant bands,  380 

Herschelman,  23 

Herzenstein,    28 

Heyden,  36 

Hungary,  35,  61 

Holy  Alliance,  34,  422 ;   Synod,  393 

IHodor,  76 

Industry,   417 

Institutions,  3 

Insurrections,  12;  general,  13,  15 

Ivan   the   Terrible,    32 

Japanese  war,  6,  10,  25,  103;  cost 

of,    II 

Jewish  question,  64,  65 ;  families,  51 
Jews,  41,  55,  74,  307;  as  soldiers, 
80 ;  expulsion  of,  64,  65 ;  massacre 
of,  46,  54,  57,  89;  occupation  of , 
66;  persecution  of,  84.  {See  also 
Priests'   advice) 

Karaviev,   345 

Kaulbars,  23,  27,  53,  55;  position 

in  court,  54 
"Kazan  Peasants'  Weekly,"  22a 
Kennard.   See    Russian    peasants, 

book  on 
Khristalev.   See  Nossar 
Kiev,  77 
Kipling,    443 
Kishinev,  42,  76 
Konovitzin,   23,   27,    52,   55 
Korolenko,  36,  237,  238,  423;  letter 

to  Filinon,  238-240 
Kronstadt,  217,  377 
Krushevan,  42,  164;  massacre,  76 
Kutler,  36,  46,  84 

Labour  Group,  211,  215,  258,  282, 
284,  327,  328;  solution  of  land 
question,  337 


INDEX 


475 


Landlords,  90,  227,  280;  gain 
through  emancipation  of  serf  s,  204 

Land  question,  211,  ;j2i,  368; 
Anikine  on,  432 ;  division  of 
land,  205,    206;    Tolstoi  on,  432 

Laws  concerning  non- Russian 
races,  61 

League  of  Russian  Men,  54,  61,  70, 
81,  87,  128;  official  organ  of,  85 

Lendin,  370 

Letts,    26 

Lithuanians,  26 

Lvov,  36,  90 

Lynch  justice,  247,  248 

Maeterlinck,  443,  452 

Magazines.  See  "Novoe  Vremya," 
"Russian      Wealth,"      "Sviet" 

Manchuria,     10 

Manifesto,  40,  43.  See  Czar's  mani- 
festo of  October  19,  1905;  and 
Viborg  manifesto 

Martial  law,  58,  85-87 

Marx,  439 

Masses,  227;  democracy  of,  157, 
159;  education  of,  322 

Massacre,  44,  45,  51,  58;  Govern- 
ment encourages,  5 1 ;  of  Jan- 
uary 22,  1905,  II,  85;  of  non- 
Russian    races,    24 

Michael,   Archamandrite,    36 

Mill,  442 

Milyoukov,  84,  96,  305 ;  and  the 
enemy,  306;  in  America,  311; 
early  attitude  toward  revolu- 
tion, 304;  opportunism  of,  289; 
persecution  of,  293 ;  statement 
of,  288;  Stolypine,  309,316 

Ministers,  5 

Mohammedfan  Group,  285 

Monarchists' congress  of  July,  1907, 
127 

Morley,  441,  442 

Moscow,  23,  32,  33 

Nap)oleon,  421 

Navy,  104,  107;  mutiny  of,  362 

Newspapers,  58,  79,  85.  {See  also 
"For  Fatherland  and  Czar;" 
' '  Kazan  Peasants*  Weekly ; ' ' 
Northern  Star;"  "Soldiers 
Voice") 

Nietsche,   443 

"Northern    Star,"    302 

Nossar,  365 

Novitzki,  27,  53 

"Novoe    Vremya,"    249 

Novgorod,   32 


Octobrists,  72,  89,  291 

Odessa,  23,  28,  54,  85,  86;  Mas- 
sacre of,  October,  1905,  27,  52 

Old  Believers,  156;  advanced  ele- 
ment of  Russian  population,  411, 
punishment  of,  394 

Orlov,  Prince,  23,  24 

Peasant,  agriculture,  175;  children, 
174;  dwellings,  70;  women,    173 

Peasant  group,     159,  222 

Peasantry,  130,  131;  Bessarabian, 
68;  programme  of,  225,  226; 
racial  hatred  among,  68; 
religious  belief  of,  397;  revolts, 
229-231 

Peasants' Union,  24,  215,  222,  225, 
272;  Congress  of  1905,  338 

People's  Party,  210 

Peter  the  Great,  33,  34,  38,  112, 
114,   125 

Petrov,  Father,  36,  39,  409;  his 
letter,  402-404 

Pobiedonostzev,  22,  78 

Poland,  23,  61 

Poles,  II,  26,  76,  89 

Police,  44,  47.  Si>  223,  249 

Press,  73,  224;  foreign,  10; 
Government  newspapers,  85 

Priesthood,  36,  129 

Priests,  154,  155,  224;  advice  con- 
cerning the  Jews,  395 ;  persecu- 
tion of,  397  {See  also  Michael, 
Archamandrite,  Petrov,  Father) 

Prisons,  84,  236 

Progressists  or  Peaceful  Regener- 
ators,   135 

Prussia,  61,  106-109 

Pureschevitch,  43,  73,  302 

Railroad  Union,  218,  274,  282;  in 
Siberia,  13;  strike,  217,  265 

Red  Cross,   80,    104 

Rousseau,    428,    429 

Russia,  105,  no,  165,  332,  419; 
future  of  humanity,  3;  powers 
foreign,  416;  present  struggle, 
18;  private  income,  124;  pro- 
found spiritual  upheaval,  438; 
regeneration,  8;  tradition,  na- 
tional and   political,   4 

Russian  assembly,  70;  church, 
origin  of,  154;  development  of 
the,  5 ;  farmer,  121,  '*  Russian 
Flag,"  28,  10 1,  283;  Government, 
126;  "Russian  Peasant,"  by 
'ennard,  150;  people  and 
Czarism,  415;  people's  new  con- 


I& 


476 


RUSSIA'S    MESSAGE 


Russian   assembly — Continued 
ception  of  life,  438;  problem  uni- 
versal in  its   applications,     419 

Russian  Revolution,  209,  213 ;  dawn 
of  new  civilisation,  452;  Finnish 
people,  359;  goal  of,  382;  inter- 
national capital,  369,  415; 
literature  of,  221;  problem  of, 
418;  spirit  among  working 
people,    282 

Russian  Revolutionary  Party, 
265;  activities   of,    224 

Russian  Revolutionists,  44,  265; 
activities  of,  224 

Russian  Revolution  movements, 
36,  277,  287,  288;  Duma,  9; 
in    Poland,    360 

Russia's  confidence  in  future,  17; 
fight,  417;  Magna  Charta,  279; 
message,  414,  452;  rulers,  413; 
social  problem,  449 ;  success,  267 ; 
tragedy,   14 

St.  Bartholomew's  eve,  27 
St.   Petersburg,  massacre  of  Jan- 
uary,    1905,     45 
Schools,    10,    107 
Senate,    37,    107 
Sergius,   23,   96 
Siedlice,  49 
Social  Democratic  Party,  215,  301; 

Deputies,    prosecution    of,    367; 

guerilla  bands   of,    38 
Social  Democrats,  302 ;  programme 

of,   318 
Socialism,     448;    among     Russian 

working  men,    210;  view   of  in 

Russia,  435 
Socialist      commune,      161;     land 

reform,  329;    nationalist    party, 

343. 

Socialist  Revolutionary  Party,  215, 
325;  army,  382;  demands  of, 
326;  on  verge  of  fundamental 
change,  379;  peasantry,  325, 
388;  programme    of,  335,  336 

Socialist  Revolutionists,  378;  cam- 
paign of,  272,  273;  execution  of 
officials  by,  375 

"Soldiers  Voice,"  383,  385 


State,  finances,  334;    religion,    23; 

slavery,  99;  socialism,     126 
Stolypine,  48,  87,  89,  99,  105,  m; 

reform,  179;  second  Duma,  297; 

strikes,  351,  358 
Subbotich,  General,  30,  36,  384 
Suffrage,  12;  universal,  280 

Tariff,   185 

Tartars,   1 1 

Taxation,  38,  228,  334 

Taxes,  11,  15,  175,  176,  203;  Jews 

80,   81;  Peasants,    205 
Tchaykovsky,    311 
Teachers,     96;  condition    of,     95; 

salaries  of,  321 
Tichamirov,    66,    67,    75 
Tolstoi,  36,  46,  156,  408,  414,  427, 

432,    434;  and   Marxism,    431 
Trepov,    44,    82,    88 
Trubetzkoi,    36 
Turgeniev,  4,  96,  195 
Turkestan,  38 

Ukase,   213,  214 
Union  of  Fatherland,  69,  70 
Union  of  Unions,  274 
United  States,  8,   16 
Universities,  361 
Urussov,   26,  47,  66,   102 

Viborg    Manifesto,    16,    293,    282; 

political  nature  of,  316 
Villages,  169;  quarantine  of,  167 
Von   Plehve,    42,    95 

Wages,  190,  350 

William  II.,  22 

Witte,  47,  219,  477;  conditions  of 

Russian  working  men,  182,  354; 

Czar,    23;  reforms,  112,  scheme 

to  foil  revolution,  355 
Women,   274 

Zemstvos,  94,  95;  congress  of,  272, 

27s 
Zeretelly,  317;  address,  297;  decla- 
ration against  the  Government, 
319;  peasants,  366 


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